The Straits Times/15 November 2017

SINGAPORE – A former United Overseas Bank (UOB) officer was sentenced on Wednesday (Nov 15) to four years and nine months’ jail after misappropriating almost $525,000 belonging to one of the bank’s clients.

Bentley Lee Chang Yeh, now 37, was also fined $50,000 after he pleaded guilty in August to two charges of criminal breach of trust involving about $405,000, and one count of conducting fund management business without holding a Capital Markets Services licence.

Another charge of criminal breach of trust involving about $120,000 was considered in sentencing.

Lee committed most of his crimes after leaving UOB, but remained in contact with his victim.

Lee had started out as a UOB personal banker in 2005. After becoming a relationship manager there three years later, he got to know his victim, retiree David Seah Joo Seng, 69.

Lee became a home loan specialist for the bank in 2009.

On May 21 that year, he registered a firm known as United Overseas Investment Management (UOIM)- which is not affiliated to UOB – under his mother’s name.

He did this as he wanted to set up his own business in investment and shares, and foreign exchange for extra income. He resigned from the bank in January 2010 to manage UOIM full time.

Even though Lee’s mother was named as UOIM’s sole proprietor, she had no part to play in the firm. Lee, who was solely responsible for managing its business, de-registered it in September 2010.

In January 2012, he set up Lee & Lee FX Capital, a sole proprietorship under his own name to continue his business of investing in shares and foreign exchange. It ceased operating in April 2013.

Deputy Public Prosecutor Grace Goh said that between April 2009 and January 2013, on Lee’s recommendation, Mr Seah and his wife Mary Gomes invested almost $773,000 into 12 capital-guaranteed investment notes issued by either UOIM or Lee & Lee.

“These notes promised guaranteed monthly returns ranging between 1 per cent and 10 per cent with tenures ranging from one month to five years. Funds raised from these notes were to be used for investment purposes,” she added.

On May 12, 2009, Mr Seah agreed to invest about $473,000 and a cashier’s order for the amount was deposited into UOIM’s bank account.

However, Lee used only about one-quarter of the money to invest. He used the remaining sum for his own expenses and by December 2010, only about $652 was left in UOIM’s bank account.

He misappropriated an additional $170,000 of Mr Seah’s money in 2011 after the retiree entrusted him with more cash.

When Mr Seah did not get back his money when his investments matured, he alerted the police on Jan 8, 2014.

DPP Goh said that this case involved a large sum of money and urged the court to sentence Lee to at least five years’ jail and a fine of $50,000.

His lawyer Irving Choh pleaded for a two-year jail sentence, saying that Mr Seah had obtained a partial restitution of $100,000.

Lee, who was offered bail of $200,000, will be appealing against his sentence.

For each count of criminal breach of trust, he could have been jailed for up to 20 years and fined.

News Source: The Straits Times

Rigzone/15 November 2017

Fundamental conditions in the oil market are continuing to improve, that is the key takeaway of research note sent to Rigzone recently by investment banking firm Jefferies.

Although oil and gas analysts at the organization conceded that the industry is ‘not out of the woods’ just yet, they pointed to a number of positive trends that have been helping the sector.

“Demand growth has been strong; OPEC conformity with production targets has been good and an extension seems likely; and we believe that US production growth could under-deliver in 2018,” analysts at Jefferies said in the research note.

The analysts also predicted that if OPEC/non-OPEC production cuts are extended through the end of 2018, the oil market would remain in ‘modest under-supply’ until 2019. Jefferies’ ‘top picks’ in the integrated oil sector were also revealed as Chevron Corporation and Royal Dutch Shell plc.

“We estimate Chevron’s break-even price will drop to $44 per barrel in 2018 as its high-margin production in Australia and the Permian Basin continues to ramp up. We expect production growth to reach 10 percent in 2018, and see ample capacity for a progressive dividend,” Jefferies analysts said.

Shell is believed to have the most ‘resilient’ cash flow profile in the European integrated oil sector, according to Jefferies analysts, yet the stock’s dividend yield ‘remains the highest in the peer group’.

“With Shell now establishing another quarter of robust cash flows, market attention will now shift to the company’s capital markets updates on November 28,” analysts said.

Earlier this month, Shell posted an earnings boost of almost 50 percent in the third quarter.

News Source: Rigzone

CNBC/15 November 2017

A global liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply glut may soon be offset by a rapid uptick in demand, Oil Search CEO Peter Botten said Wednesday.

“The market has fundamentally changed in the past few years,” Botten said at the Abu Dhabi Petroleum Exhibition Conference (ADIPEC).

“It has clearly been driven by oversupply but this won’t necessarily last that long amid a burgeoning demand for LNG.”

American shale drillers upended the energy industry after years of booming production — and the U.S. wants to sell even more of its excess gas abroad.

On Tuesday, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said the U.S. was on course to become the leading global gas exporter by the mid-2020s. In the energy watchdog’s flagship publication, the IEA said U.S. LNG was also accelerating a major structural shift towards more flexible international gas markets.

The U.S. shale revolution paved the way for a three-year oil price downturn that sent crude spiraling from more than $100 a barrel in 2014 to about $60 today. That has piled pressure on the oil-dependent economies of OPEC nations and forced a round of production cuts this year.

Meanwhile, China — the world’s third-largest gas buyer — is importing more LNG as the government looks to become less dependent on dirty coal as part of its drive to clear the skies.

‘Hugely exciting’ time for LNG

News Source: CNBC

CNBC/15 November 2017

Construction has begun on a wind farm that will supply 100 percent of the power required to operate a Facebook data center in Papillion, Nebraska.

The Rattlesnake Creek wind farm in Dixon County, Nebraska, will have a capacity of 320 megawatts (MW). Under a power purchase agreement, Facebook will buy power from 200 MW of the farm’s capacity to operate its data center.

Facebook’s director of global energy, Bobby Hollis, said that the business was now “one step closer to our goal of powering all of our operations with clean and renewable energy.”

A subsidiary of Enel Green Power North America (EGPNA), Rattlesnake Creek Wind Project, owns the site. EGPNA is the U.S. renewable energy business of the Enel Group; investment in the facility’s construction is approximately $430 million.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. is “home to one of the largest and fastest-growing wind markets in the world.”

The Enel site will produce roughly 1.3 terawatt hours per year when fully operational. This will be enough to meet the “equivalent annual consumption needs” of over 105,000 U.S. homes, Enel said, helping to avoid the emission of around 940,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide annually.

“This project consolidates our growing presence in the U.S. as our company enters into a new state and expands our business with new partners,” Antonio Cammisecra, the head of Enel Green Power, said in a statement.

“We are thrilled to be able to support Facebook’s growing renewable energy needs in Nebraska and be a part of driving economic development in the region,” Cammisecra added.

News Source: CNBC

The Guardian/14 November 2017

The Norwegian government is being sued by climate activists over a decision to open up areas of the Arctic Ocean for oil exploration, a move they say endangers the lives of existing and future generations.

The plaintiffs, led by environmental organisations Greenpeace and Youth and Nature, will on Tuesday claim that the Norwegian government has violated a constitutional environmental law which guarantees citizens’ rights to a healthy environment.

The law, known as Section 112, states: “Everyone has the right to an environment that safeguards their health and to nature where production ability and diversity are preserved. Natural resources must be managed from a long-term and versatile consideration which also upholds this right for future generations.”

“We have for years tried to stop the expansion of Norway’s oil extraction, from both local and global considerations,” said Truls Gulowsen, head of Greenpeace Norway. “As far as granting concessions for the Arctic is concerned, not only have our objections been ignored and overrun, but the state has also paid no heed to the guidelines from their own appointed advisers, such as the polar institute and the environment agency, who both recommended that the majority of concessions in this area be turned down.”

In fighting the case, Greenpeace is relying on the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which states that to meet the goals set out in the 2015 Paris accord, oil production must be wound down, not escalated. The state rejects this argument, claiming that all their preliminary assessments of the potential environmental impact have been conducted satisfactorily.

But according to supreme court attorney Pål W Lorentzen, who heads environmental group Norsk Klimastiftelsen, “the government has already violated Section 112 by granting concessions which will make it impossible for the country to meet the targets agreed upon in the Paris accord. For every intervention [in terms of oil exploration], thorough pre-assessments and evaluations must be carried out and made public, and the state has failed on both accounts,” he said.

The state is expected to focus on the interpretation of the law, stating in its closing submission that “Section 112 has not been formulated to provide individual rights in the traditional sense. Instead, the first and second paragraphs express societal aims with regard to environment, conservation of nature and management of natural resources … Norway does not have a legal responsibility for emissions from its oil and gas exports.”

Norway’s attorney-general, Fredrik Sejersted, told the Guardian: “The state considers this case important in the sense of it concerning important societal issues and the interpretation of an important constitutional law paragraph

“At the same time, we don’t regard it as particularly challenging in legal terms, as in our opinion it is pretty clear that the Norwegian authorities have fulfilled all their obligations to the constitution, and that Norway has complied with and will continue to comply with all their international environmental and climate obligations.”

The case is brought not only on the grounds of harm inflicted on the local environment, but on the contribution any oil extraction will make to global warming. Norway is already the seventh largest CO2 emission exporter in the world, according to a recent report.

Gulowsen believes Greenpeace’s case is strong. “We were motivated by climate litigation in countries such as the Netherlands, the US, Switzerland and New Zealand that has shown that when the gulf between science and political decisions becomes too wide, the courts play an increasingly important part in taking charge of the long-term perspectives of societal development,” he said

“In times when politicians are wavering and non-committal, it demands courage from the courts to overrule political decisions in order to safeguard our future.”

“Our present government seems to be obsessed with giving the oil industry free pickings from the top shelf, conveniently ignoring any connection between the 2015 Paris accord which the authorities were so proud of being one of the first signees to, and the actual oil policy that is being executed,” said Gulowsen.

The case is being heard at Oslo district court, and is scheduled to last two weeks.

News Source: The Guardian

Rigzone/14 November 2017

NEW YORK, Nov 14 (Reuters) – Oil prices fell for a third day in a row on Tuesday on forecasts for rising U.S. crude output and a gloomier outlook for global demand growth in a report from the International Energy Agency (IEA).

In addition, analysts said oil prices were pressured by a global commodities selloff, led by base metals like nickel and copper, due to weaker-than-expected economic data from China.

Brent futures fell 95 cents, or 1.5 percent, to settle at $62.21 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude lost $1.06, or 1.9 percent, to end at $55.70, the lowest close for both contracts since Nov. 3.

Market watchers said declines in recent days caused hedge funds and some other traders to get nervous and sell out of their positions after speculators amassed a record bullish position in the petroleum complex.

Just last week, prices for both crude benchmarks hit their highest levels since 2015.

Ahead of data from the American Petroleum Institute (API), an industry trade group, analysts in a Reuters poll forecast U.S. crude stocks declined by 2.2 million barrels last week. API will release its report at 4:30 p.m. EST (2130 GMT) on Tuesday.

The IEA, meanwhile, delivered a surprisingly downbeat outlook for oil demand in its monthly market report, showing an expected slowdown in consumption that was at odds with a more bullish view from the producer group OPEC on Monday.

The Paris-based IEA cut its oil demand growth forecast by 100,000 barrels per day (bpd) for this year and next, to an estimated 1.5 million bpd in 2017 and 1.3 million bpd in 2018.

The IEA said warmer temperatures could reduce consumption, while sharply rising output from some producer countries might bring back the global crude glut in the first half of 2018.

“The IEA slashing its oil demand growth forecast for this year and the next has dampened some of the bullish sentiment prevailing in the market,” Abhishek Kumar, Senior Energy Analyst at Interfax Energy’s Global Gas Analytics in London.

This sentiment comes in part on the back of rising U.S. oil output <C-OUT-T-EIA>, which has grown by more than 14 percent since mid-2016 to a record 9.62 million bpd.

The U.S. government said on Monday U.S. shale production in December would rise for a 12th consecutive month, increasing by 80,000 bpd.

“The recent price support, namely the tension in the Middle East, has been swept aside as rising rig counts and U.S. shale output (are) in the focus of traders,” PVM Oil Associates analyst Tamas Varga said.

Despite the cautious sentiment, traders said oil prices were unlikely to fall far, largely due to supply restrictions led by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and Russia, which have helped reduce excess stockpiles.

News Source: Rigzone

The Guardian/13 November 2017

The burning of fossil fuels around the world is set to hit a record high in 2017, climate scientists have warned, following three years of flat growth that raised hopes that a peak in global emissions had been reached.

The expected jump in the carbon emissions that drive global warming is a “giant leap backwards for humankind”, according to some scientists. However, other experts said they were not alarmed, saying fluctuations in emissions are to be expected and that big polluters such as China are acting to cut emissions.

Global emissions need to reach their peak by 2020 and then start falling quickly in order to have a realistic chance of keeping global warming below the 2C danger limit, according to leading scientists. Whether the anticipated increase in CO2 emissions in 2017 is just a blip that is followed by a falling trend, or is the start of a worrying upward trend, remains to be seen.

Much will depend on the fast implementation of the global climate deal sealed in Paris in 2015 and this is the focus of the UN summit of the world’s countries in Bonn, Germany this week. The nations must make significant progress in turning the aspirations of the Paris deal into reality, as the action pledged to date would see at least 3C of warming and increasing extreme weather impacts around the world.

The 12th annual Global Carbon Budget report published on Monday is produced by 76 of the world’s leading emissions experts from 57 research institutions and estimates that global carbon emissions from fossil fuels will have risen by 2% by the end of 2017, a significant rise.

“Global CO2 emissions appear to be going up strongly once again after a three-year stable period. This is very disappointing,” said Prof Corinne Le Quéré, director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the UK’s University of East Anglia and who led the new research. “The urgency for reducing emissions means they should really be already decreasing now.”

“There was a big push to sign the Paris agreement on climate change but there is a feeling that not very much has happened since, a bit of slackening,” she said. “What happens after 2017 is very open and depends on how much effort countries are going to make. It is time to take really seriously the implementation of the Paris agreement.” She said the hurricanes and floods seen in 2017 were “a window into the future”.

The new analysis is based on the available energy use data for 2017 and projections for the latter part of the year. It estimates that 37bn tonnes of CO2 will be emitted from burning fossil fuels, the highest total ever.

The main reason for the rise is an expected 3.5% increase in emissions in China, the world’s biggest polluter, where low rains have reduced low-carbon hydroelectric output and industrial activity has increased. India’s rise in emissions was modest compared to previous years at 2%, while the US and EU are both on track for small falls.

2017 is likely to be the hottest year ever recorded in which there was no El Niño event, a natural global cycle that temporarily nudges up global temperature. The concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere also saw a record jump in 2016, and other greenhouse gases such as methane and nitrous oxide from agriculture and industry are also rising.

“The news that emissions are rising after the three-year hiatus is a giant leap backwards for humankind,” said Amy Luers, executive director of Future Earth, a global research initiative. “Pushing the Earth closer to tipping points is deeply concerning. Emissions need to peak soon and approach zero by 2050.”

Rigzone/13 November 2017

Oil and gas companies employ various measures to protect their increasingly sophisticated operational infrastructure. Nevertheless, cyber-criminals are adept at finding vulnerabilities to gain access to these critical systems – and their efforts appear to be paying off. As a 2016 white paper from Underwriters Laboratories (UL) observes, cyberattacks against critical energy infrastructure systems have been on the rise in recent years.

A key vulnerability that cyber-criminals exploit is the oil and gas supply chain, says UL Cybersecurity Lead Ken Modeste.

“Attackers are using techniques to infiltrate oil and gas with the intent to disrupt service, and these techniques are being understood as finding a weaker link in a less secure environment to then pivot to the oil and gas infrastructure,” Modeste said. “A foundation for working on a solution is to drive the supply chain into best practices that are adopted by the organization.”

To learn more about the oil and gas supply chain’s susceptibility to cyberattacks, along with approaches to mitigate them, read on for excerpts from Rigzone’s recent conversation with Modeste.

Rigzone: What are some of the key trends you’re seeing regarding cyberattacks against energy infrastructure, particularly in oil and gas?

Modeste: Since the Ukraine power grid attacks occurred in the last two years, trends focusing on energy and oil and gas tend to be increasing. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently alerted in October that “DHS has confidence that this campaign is still ongoing, and threat actors are actively pursuing their ultimate objectives over a long-term campaign.” This alert is identifying a trend where multi stage attacks are being performed. Lower-level targets like third party suppliers are being used as staging grounds for the true intended primary target. Going after a third party to get to the intended victim involves different levels of engagements as the softer, less-secure target is infiltrated and then pivoted to the real asset.

Rigzone: Which types of oil and gas facilities are most vulnerable to cyberattacks?

Modeste: At the beginning of the decade, there was more of a surveillance around oil and gas which was based on the reports of American utility companies as primary targets. Therefore, oil and gas producers and liquid distributors could be a step to focusing on utilities. National energy infrastructure organizations and oil production facilities may become primary targets when the ultimate goal is to disrupt the utility supply to the broader economy. The most vulnerable would be those that are least prepared in terms of risk assessment and management, who may have flawed supply chain partner practices and improperly trained staff. As an example, if employees can download a menu from the nearby favorite food delivery company, then all you need to attack is a small family-owned restaurant website which is based on reconnaissance of targeted employees’ eating habits.

Rigzone: How do these attacks typically occur, and what are some potential effects?

Modeste: These attacks begin with reconnaissance of regular public data. For example, knowing from which restaurants targeted company staff tend to have food delivered or picked up. This means that current employees’ public habits are easily discovered. Then either a phishing email campaign, or “watering hole attack” malware, can be utilized to infiltrate either the primary target or a less-secure target. A phishing email is one that is meant to hide its true intent and source, and a watering hole attack can consist of embedding malware in a popular website destination. A lesser (less secure) target could be a supply chain vendor, like a law firm, consulting firm, facility contracting firm or similar. Once this target is compromised, the attack can pivot to the true intended target. One of the tried and true methods also includes acquiring credentials for secondary systems by focusing on victims with some weaker security practices.

Rigzone: What are the unique cybersecurity challenges in oil and gas?

Modeste: Asset owners in the oil and gas space have the unique challenge that their operational technology (OT) networks are large and operational and doesn’t lend itself to massive upgrades. With some of these OT networks either having public internet connections, old legacy systems that are either not supported by the vendor or are unpatched, non-secure OT protocols that communicate authentication and authorization means in easily circumvented means, and the typical use of remote connectivity for either support, troubleshooting or remote administration. Adding to this, slow industry adoption of either malware detections and anomaly detection systems, oil and gas could potentially be a rich target. Standards and specifications that guide to secure use of OT systems that understand the risks and mitigate for events need to be more widely debated and adopted.

Rigzone: What’s the industry doing right regarding preventing cyberattacks?

Modeste: Education of users is probably the number one thing that is moving in the right direction. Industry is recognizing the potential for disruption and is beginning to heed some of the public information. DHS and FBI continuous monitoring and notification, especially with the latest alert, can start providing guidance for an operator to begin to build practices that can shore up defenses. Being aware of the methods of attack are the first key steps.

Rigzone: Where is there room for improvement?

Modeste: Securing the supply chain and third-party partners needs to be improved. As can be seen by the trends, they are both being used as a pivot into organizations. Defining standards and best practices that are required within an organization doesn’t help if it is not expected of an organizations’ partners. These methodologies should be promoted – in a connected way – through to all entities with which oil and gas is doing business.

News Source: Rigzone

Rigzone/13 November 2017

Employment prospects for geoscientists in Australia have remained unchanged since March, according to the latest quarterly survey conducted by the Australian Institute of Geoscientists (AIG).

The national unemployment rate amongst Australia’s professional geoscientists, as at September 30, was 12.2 percent, up slightly from the June 30 figure of 11.3 percent. Underemployment amongst self-employed geoscientists for the same period, however, fell to 18 percent from 19 percent.

The combined figures point to no improvement in employment prospects for the geoscience professions as a whole since March, AIG confirmed in an organization statement.

“Australian geoscientists were looking forward to an improvement in the employment situation in the September survey due to what appeared to be improved sentiment amongst professional geoscientists,” said AIG spokesperson Andrew Waltho in an organization release.

“The survey results, however, don’t contain any good news,” he added.

Almost 62 percent of unemployed and underemployed geoscientists reported not having worked or achieved their desired workload for more than 12 months and the proportion of geoscientists considering leaving the profession increased from 5.9 percent in June to 7.1 percent in the latest survey.

News Source: Rigzone

Rigzone/10 November 2017

Rapidly changing business and market conditions can send the supply chain into a tailspin and turn managing it effectively into a nightmare task. More and more companies – including premier oil and gas E&P company, Anadarko – are leveraging sourcing to address this. The results are compelling; not only does agile sourcing yield an agile supply chain, but it also drives bottom-line benefits.

To be truly agile, sourcing processes need to tick a few boxes: They must be adaptable to changing business and market conditions, scalable for growth, automated for efficiency, transparent to stakeholders, enabled by technology, and optimized through analytics.

“The end goal of this agile process is really to respond quickly, capitalize on emerging market opportunities, and use our sourcing process to optimize outcomes for the business,” Aaron Rubinstein, Manager of Shared Services and Technology, and Global Supply Chain at Anadarko explained in a recent Institute of Supply Management webinar. Speaking from his own experiences with agile sourcing at Anadarko, he noted, “We laid out a business case for eSourcing in terms of how it helps us achieve those end goals. It really boils down to four key areas: building a knowledge base, gaining efficiencies, improving transparency, and then being able to leverage analytics in our process.”

As Rubinstein points out, there are a few key ways to create sourcing processes that drive bottom-line results for the entire business. Let’s take a closer look:

Build a Sourcing Knowledge Base

It’s time to share the sourcing knowledge. Not only does this effectively pool resources, but it also yields a variety of practical efficiencies. A central sourcing knowledge base mitigates the effects of employee attrition and enables smoother staff rotations throughout a sourcing cycle’s lifetime. As procurement data is collected into a single source, it can also facilitate knowledge sharing across organizational silos and standardize sourcing best-practices — both highly impactful elements of sourcing strategy that may have been previously overlooked.

Gain Efficiencies

If you want to rapidly drop savings to your bottom line, it’s time to streamline your sourcing efforts. Start by implementing technology that replaces manual tasks with automated processes. Look for features that allow for expedited event creation through templates, streamlined communication through real-time chat features, and automated compilation of bid responses. You’ll be bowled over by the time and money you can save when you have these benefit at your fingertips.

Improve Transparency

Transparency can be transformative — and you might be surprised by how much it can impact sourcing results. When vendors have a crystal clear understanding of a project’s timelines and specific requirements, they can come to the table with their best offers — which saves you time and money in the long run. Similarly, when internal stakeholders have an overarching view of what the sourcing project allows, they can better prioritize and make more informed decisions throughout the entire process.

Leverage Analytics

Sourcing is inherently disparate; it manages multiple projects across multiple departments across the organization. Data is what connects those dots. Leverage analytics to undercover impressive insights around pricing trends, market dynamics, and sourcing successes. By listening to the story that data tells, sourcing teams can more effectively drive overall sourcing strategies.

Strategic sourcing is an area with massive potential for any enterprise. As a recent report from Harvard Business Review in partnership with Scout RFP notes, it plays a wide-ranging and highly influential role in the enterprise’s effort to address business challenges, build strategic partnerships, and maximize opportunities. Enterprises that want to take advantage of this potential should start by focusing on agile sourcing processes and the enterprise-wide benefits will follow.

News Source: Rigzone