Regional News

Bloomberg PetroChina Co. is rewarding shareholders with a higher — and symbolic — payout after its best half-year profit in more than three years. The nation’s biggest oil and gas producer raised total dividends for the first six months by almost one-third to 0.0888 yuan per share. The lucky payout — eight is widely considered an auspicious number in China …

Bloomberg Penn Virginia Corp. has reached out to potential buyers including Hilcorp Energy Co. and WildHorse Resource Development Corp. ahead of a sale process slated to start next month, according to people familiar with the matter. The Houston, Texas-based company will open a data room and solicit initial bids in September, said the people, who asked to not be identified …

Bloomberg Oil touched the highest level in three weeks after a government report showed a bigger US crude stockpile decline than expected. Futures in New York advanced as much as 1.5 percent. The Energy Information Administration reported nationwide crude inventories fell 2.57 million barrels last week, larger than a decrease of 1.49 million barrels that analysts forecast in a Bloomberg …

Bloomberg Exxon Mobil Corp. set a goal for reducing emissions from its Canadian oil sands, the second time this year the world’s biggest oil explorer by market value published a greenhouse-gas target. Imperial Oil Ltd., a Calgary-based subsidiary 69-percent owned by Exxon, will reduce the intensity of emissions by 10 percent over the next five years, compared with 2016 levels, …

Bloomberg Total SA’s withdrawal from Iran’s giant South Pars gas field has given China another chance to secure a stake in the world’s most coveted energy assets: abundant and low-cost Middle Eastern oil and gas. Chinese companies have invested in Iraq, the United Arab Emirates and Iran in recent years, and have expressed interest in oil and gas projects in …

Bloomberg SpiceJet Ltd. completed its maiden flight using a blend of aviation fuel and oil from jatropha seeds, furthering Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s push for greater use of alternative resources to cut India’s dependence on oil imports. A Bombardier Q400 aircraft made the one-way trip to New Delhi from the city of Dehradun, about 200 kilometres from the capital. The …

Bloomberg Italy’s gas pipeline operator Snam SpA signed a memorandum of understanding with China’s State Grid International Development as part of Finance Minister Giovanni Tria’s trip to the Asian country. Snam and State Grid International, a unit of the biggest Chinese power distributor, agreed to examine a range of opportunities in China and elsewhere, with a focus on the use …

Bloomberg India’s largest natural gas pipeline operator has invited users to book surplus network capacity online as the country prepares to create a distribution hub that sets benchmark prices. State-run GAIL India Ltd., which controls 70 percent of the nation’s network, launched a website for online bookings of pipeline capacity to ship gas across the country. GAIL, with 11,400 kilometres …

Bloomberg TransCanada Corp. won a 49 percent price increase for space on the pipeline it’s building to haul shale gas from Appalachian fields as labor shortages and escalating land prices pushed construction costs almost $1 billion higher. US regulators approved the Calgary-based company’s request to charge gas explorers $14.663 per dekatherm for space on its Mountaineer XPress Project, 275-kilometre in …

Bloomberg China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. raised its dividend payout after half-year earnings jumped to a record, fuelled by improving refining profits and a rebound in crude prices that brought its oil and gas exploration unit closer to breaking even. The world’s biggest refiner by capacity, known as Sinopec, proposed an interim dividend of 0.16 yuan a share, a 60 …