General

Price tag of BP oil spill clean-up rising

Costs now top $3 billion, leaving BP vulnerable to a takeover

Efforts to cap the deep-sea oil well leaking into the Gulf of Mexico resumed on Monday, five days after Hurricane Alex brought the operation to a grind. Attention is now turning to how BP will cover the mounting costs of disaster. BP revealed that its costs related the spill have risen to US$3.12 billion so far. Meanwhile, estimates suggest between 35,000 and 60,000 barrels of oil per day are gushing into the sea, and a project which would permanently cap the spewing well cannot begin until mid-August at the earliest, when engineers finish drilling relief wells. As BP faces a massive bill, reports say the company is turning to rival oil groups and sovereign wealth funds to prevent a possible hostile takeover bid. The National, an Abu Dhabi-based newspaper, reported that sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East have proposed making a strategic investment in BP, and Britain’s Sunday Times said BP was seeking a strategic investor to buy a five to 10 per cent stake in the firm with a price tag of up to US$9.1 billion.

National Post

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