News and AnalysIs for

Crude oil prices have taken a bit of a tumble recently so we thought we should update our standard charts as well as show a new one we have been working on.

This was a decidedly minor news item. It only merited a tweet, not even an article in Hydrocarbons Colombia. But as I investigated, and thought about it, it opened up a number of relevant ideas about E&P, the environment and communities.

Time for us to review prices and netbacks for our Colombia focused publicly traded companies. Prices were up in the quarter but so were costs so not a good quarter on average. As always, individual results may vary.

I think MinEnergia and the Colombian government more broadly are mixing up two important, and related strategies to the detriment of the E&P industry. I have written about this before but it is worth repeating.

Or why Hacienda likes the idea of ECP diversifying away from oil and gas: It does not seem to do them very well.

Since coming back from the year-end holidays, the Colombian business news – and our modest newsletter – has been dominated by Ecopetrol’s surprise announcement that it was bidding for the country’s long haul electricity transmission provider ISA. This has put the NOC’s long-term strategy up for public debate. Coincidentally, two global thinktanks published separate but similar studies warning National Oil Companies to change their investment plans. A song for Felipe Bayón.

A reader question arose about forecasting oil prices for business cases so we thought it worthwhile to go through some of the alternative methodologies and say what we would do.

Recently, I came across several articles, reports and webinars dealing with the special challenges of women in the oil and gas industry. Then I interviewed Marianna Boza, O&G and Mining Head at of Brigard Urrutia and one of the driving forces behind the Colombian chapter of Women in Oil and Gas, an initiative to bring greater gender equity to the sector.

Last Friday Brent nearly closed at US$60 and in honor of that auspicious event, we decided to update our short- and long-term graphs.

The most surprising news of the past week was Ecopetrol’s decision to make a bid for 51.4% of the country’s long-haul electricity transmission provider, ISA. This could be a financial trick by Hacienda to turn 8% of its Ecopetrol stock into cash, a way to assure a floor price for ISA or it could be, as ECP said in its press release, a major step along its way to becoming a diversified energy company.