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MARKET NEWS:
Brent rises near $114 as Iran offsets EU crisis
SINGAPORE, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Brent crude rose toward $114 a barrel as fears of an Iranian supply disruption mounted after the European Union agreed to cut off oil imports from the No. 2 OPEC producer, offsetting jitters over the euro zone crisis.
"It's a knee-jerk reaction as more countries are leaning to comply with the sanctions," said Ryoma Furumi, a commodity sales manager at Newedge Japan.
U.S. stock index futures signal early losses
U.S. stock index futures pointed to a lower open on Wall Street, with futures for the S&P 500 down 0.53 percent, Dow Jones futures down 0.47 percent and Nasdaq 100 futures down 0.32 percent at 0900 GMT.
European stocks were down 0.5 percent in morning trade, adding to the previous session's sharp losses as investors fretted about the region's huge refinancing needs in the first quarter, with a French bond auction on deck on Thursday.
FOREX-Euro knocked by debt worries before France auction
LONDON, Jan 5 (Reuters) - The euro hit a 15-month low against the dollar and an 11-year low versus the yen as concerns about the euro zone's deepening debt crisis ran high before a French debt auction later in the day.
"I don't think today's auction will have a dramatic effect (on the euro) unless the sale is disastrous," said Johan Javeus, chief strategist at SEB in Stockholm.
GLOBAL MARKETS-Euro zone funding fears hang over stocks, currency
LONDON, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Concern about the appetite for euro zone sovereign debt pushed European stocks lower and hit the single currency, with the first French bond auction of 2012 set to test how much progress policymakers have made in easing tensions.
"Whilst France currently clings to its AAA credit rating at the moment, the chorus of warnings from credit agencies about imminent downgrades could deter investors," Capital Spreads trader Jonathan Sudaria said.
TOP NEWS:
Thai PTTEP sees 2012 petroleum sales up 8 pct, sets 5-yr plan
BANGKOK, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Thailand's PTT Exploration and Production Pcl (PTTEP) expects 2012 petroleum sales volume to rise 8 percent to 290,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day, fuelled by rising output from new fields including those in Vietnam, Australia's Montara and South Bongkot.
The country's top oil and gas explorer has a five-year investment budget of 600 billion baht ($19.1 billion), of which 150 billion baht will be spent this year, Chief Executive Anon Sirisaengtaksin told reporters.
CNPC says foreign equity oil output tops 1 mln bpd
BEIJING, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Equity oil output from overseas projects run by China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) topped a record 1 million barrels per day last year, in line with targets, the top Chinese oil and gas producer reported.
The report by the China Petroleum Daily, a company newspaper, did not give more details of overseas production.
BP fund resumes payments to spill victims after clarification
Jan 4 (Reuters) - BP's $20 billion oil spill fund said it had resumed payments to eligible victims on Wednesday after receiving clarification from a U.S. district court regarding an escrow account set up to cover certain legal expenses incurred by the plaintiffs' lawyers.
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana had earlier asked the fund called the Gulf Coast Claims Facility (GCCF) to pay into a court supervised escrow account 6 percent of the gross settlement amount. The money from the escrow account would be used to meet certain legal expenses incurred by the plaintiffs' lawyers.
Sinopec Group says plans to double overseas equity oil output
BEIJING, Jan 5 (Reuters) - China Petrochemical Corp (Sinopec Group) aims to more than double its equity oil output from overseas projects to over 1 million barrels per day (bpd) by 2015 from 2011, the largest Chinese oil company by sales said on Thursday.
Sinopec International Petroleum Exploration and Production Corp (SIPC), its investment and operation unit for overseas upstream projects, gained 22.88 million tonnes or 457,600 bpd of oil from overseas projects last year, Sinopec Group said in a report on one of its websites (www.sinopecnews.com.cn).
Qatar keeps Feb crude supply to Asia steady -source
TOKYO, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Qatar, one of OPEC's smallest producers, has notified at least one Asian buyer that it will supply Marine and Land crude at full contracted volumes for February, unchanged from January levels, a trade source said on Thursday.
Qatar gave buyers the option of asking for cargoes to be 5 percent more or less than contracted volumes, the same as the previous month, the source added.
Enterprise, Enbridge begin open seasons for Seaway expansion
Jan 4 (Reuters) - Enterprise Products Partners LP and Enbridge Inc said on Wednesday they have begun concurrent binding open seasons to gauge shipper interest to expand the Seaway crude oil pipeline and a new pipeline that will be built from Enterprise's ECHO terminal to Port Arthur, Texas.
The initial 150,000 barrel-per-day (bpd) of capacity on the reversed system would be available by the second quarter of 2012, the companies said in a statement.
Chavez says Exxon should pay Venezuela damages
CARACAS, Jan 4 (Reuters) - President Hugo Chavez on Wednesday scoffed at an arbitration ruling ordering Venezuela to compensate Exxon Mobil for nationalizing its assets, and said the U.S. oil giant should pay the OPEC nation for "robbing" the country.
An arbitration panel of the International Chamber of Commerce awarded Exxon $908 million for claims linked to the 2007 takeover of the Cerro Negro heavy oil project following years of legal wrangling with the socialist government.
Suncor, others lift veil on pipeline support
CALGARY, Alberta, Jan 4 (Reuters) - A quintet of Canada's largest oil sands producers has contributed money and signed shipping deals in support of Enbridge Inc's Northern Gateway pipeline to the Pacific Coast, according to documents filed days before hearings into the contentious proposal are due to start.
Suncor Energy Inc , Cenovus Energy Inc , Nexen Inc , Total SA and MEG Energy Corp came forward on Wednesday for the first time with their interests in the C$5.5 billion ($5.42 billion) project in National Energy Board filings.
Ecuador plaintiffs to seek Chevron damages abroad
QUITO, Jan 4 (Reuters) - Ecuadorean plaintiffs who won an $18 billion environmental case against Chevron Corp will pursue legal action against the company overseas in a bid to collect the damages, their lawyer said on Wednesday.
An appeals court in the OPEC nation upheld a ruling on Tuesday that the U.S. oil giant should pay up, after a local judge found it guilty last February of polluting the Amazon jungle and damaging the plaintiffs' health.
REFINERY NEWS:
Japan's JX ups Mizushima FCC capacity by 2,000 bpd
TOKYO, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Japan's top oil refiner JX Nippon Oil & Energy Corp has raised the capacity of the No.3 fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) unit at its Mizushima refinery in western Japan by 2,000 barrels per day to 26,000 bpd, a trade ministry official said on Thursday.
The change took effect on Dec. 12, the official said.
Exxon reports compressor shutdown at Joliet refinery
Jan 5 (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil reported a compressor shutdown at its 238,600 refinery in Joliet, Illinois, in a filing with the U.S. National Response Center.
The company said there was "a flaring incident of the coker main fractionator over head gas," caused by the shutdown.
PetroChina Jinzhou refinery plans CDU maintenance in Q2
BEIJING, Jan 5 (Reuters) - PetroChina's Jinzhou refinery plans to shut down a 80,000 barrel-per-day (bpd) crude distillation unit for around one month of maintenance in the second quarter of this year, an industry source said on Thursday.
The maintenance could also include a fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) unit and a coking unit, the source said.
Sinopec Tianjin plans whole plant shutdown in Sept - source
BEIJING, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Sinopec Corp's Tianjin refinery and petrochemical complex plans to shut down the whole plant for 50 days' turnaround from early September, a company source said on Thursday.
The refinery, in north China's port city of Tianjin, operates 300,000 barrels per day of crude refining facilities and a one million tonne-per-year ethylene plant.
BEYOND THE HEADLINES:
EU agrees embargo on Iranian crude
BRUSSELS/TEHRAN, Jan 4 (Reuters) - European governments have agreed in principle to ban imports of Iranian oil, EU diplomats said on Wednesday, dealing a blow to Tehran that crowns new Western sanctions months before an Iranian election.
The prospective embargo by the European Union, along with tough U.S. financial measures signed into law by President Barack Obama on New Year's Eve, form a concerted Western campaign to hold back Iran's nuclear programme.
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