Perhaps it’s because I’m not close to the situation, but I just can’t fathom why anyone would want to buy BP—thinking from a brand fall-out perspective. This rumoured move by Exxon Mobil has sent BP shares upwards last week—but I’ve got an inkling that possible purchases won’t do much for the purchasers.

This week, Apache Corp. declined to comment on a public report that it might buy $12 billion of BP PLC’s assets, which seems much the safer move. But Exxon Mobil also refused to say whether or not it would bid for BP. Analysts have said the timing isn’t the greatest, and it might be in the companies best interest to wait until the storm is officially over (notwithstanding the long-term affects of the spill). Agreed.

For the time being, for the sake of the companies brands, perhaps they should keep their pocketbooks closed—with all the buzz about BP’s clean-up efforts, while oil caps to stop the flow have busted, been replaced, and now may not potentially work—things could get much worse before they get better.

(Here’s an excerpt from an article in the Financial Times, Telegraph, MSN, you can see the full piece at http://theweek.com/article/index/204609/should-exxon-buy-bp)

“Should Exxon Mobil buy fellow oil-spill villain BP, now that BP’s stock is so low? BP’s shares rose Wednesday on that rumor, started by JP Morgan oil analyst Fred Lucas, who figures that BP is about 62 percent undervalued right now, and thus ripe for a pickoff. The other company that could handle such a big merger is Shell, Lucas says, but only Exxon knows “how to price potential clean up costs and associated civil claims.” Still, would Exxon really want the hassle of cleaning up another sullied brand? Would BP let it try?”

It’s a given, we all enjoy Fridays,  but over in Australia this one is really something special. The nation’s new Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, has come in, cleaned up and thrown out that dastardly 40 per cent Resource Super Profits Tax (RSPT) we have all endured sleepless nights over between May 2, 2010 and today. It’s hard to believe it’s really gone already, isn’t it? Of course, as those waves of relief and thankfulness continue to well over us, it’s important to rake over our alternative tax with a very fine-toothed comb.

We’re now staring down the barrel at the iron ore/coal 30 per cent tax on the top 300 super-profit miners working in these commodities. The tax applies to mining houses which exceed a 12 per cent rate of return; not six per cent like Rudd previously issued. A project has to make more than A$50 million per annum profit to be tax-eligible and, most vitally of all, this tax is NOT retrospective; essentially meaning that unlike Rudd’s tax which stood to rob the miners of previous profit without any consultation, warning or vaguest input, Gillard’s revised tax targets only a very specific and more calculated portion of the industry.

Now let’s not sugar coat anything; it is still a tax, still part of Australia’s much-needed wider taxation system reform and some companies will still incur previously unaccounted charges. And, appeasing the industry whilst retaining some form of tax does look good for Gillard as she continues on in this election build-up.

As Australia’s Deputy Prime Minister, Wayne Swan, said yesterday when rumours of a deal broke there’s still “a long way to go.” This latest announcement is truly terrific news; no question. But let’s see how it all pans out in application before we start the whooping, cheering and Rudd-directed jeering.

Today the President of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has announced that the nation will postpone talks with western countries as a direct counterattack for the new UN sanctions imposed on the country, aimed at preventing its uranium enrichment nuclear programme activities.

Speaking from Tehran, he stated that this latest measure is, “a punishment to teach them a lesson to know how to have a dialogue with nations,” and alluded that there is more behind the western world’s attempts to halt this programme.

Ahmadinejad recently told press that these sanctions, which are the latest in four rounds that have taken place in December 2006, March 2007, March 2008 and June 2010, reflected western and United States attempts at “putting the brakes on Iran’s progress in nuclear technology,” and also, “to keep Iran from becoming an economic and industrial power.”

The Iranian government highlights that any uranium enrichment activity has been orchestrated within the rulings of the Atomic Energy Agency, and various news reports note that in order to reach the power required for the worst of some western fears, such as a nuclear bomb, the nation would have to do a lot more. The real question is what might Iran be working to achieve, and what might “the western and US” at large predict this to be?

Russia’s president, Dmitry Medvedev, has expressed fears of his own and notes that “the international community does not recognise the Iranian nuclear programme as transparent,” when he spoke to press at the recent G20 Summit.

Calls from the US senate last week, as pressure for the latest round of sanctions mounted, were for blocking Iran from international markets and, essentially, starving the country’s economy out. The United Arab Emirates Central Bank has reportedly requested the freezing of 11 Iran-related accounts, also. It is unclear exactly why the nuclear activity within Iran is continually so secret. It is unclear exactly what is troubling “the west and US” the most in this equation, but if no progress has been made since December 2006, this situation shows no signs of a successful outcome. Could this be our next big energy headline?  Watch this space…

Today Australia’s now notorious Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, stood and spoke, choking back tears, at his final press conference as Prime Minister at Parliament House.

Amongst the remarks made, Rudd managed to say he was “proud of the fact that we kept Australia out of the global financial crisis,” and “did my best to give Australia a fair go.”

He has handed over the reins of power to Julia Gillard, the new Labour leader who said she is “throwing open the government’s door to the mining industry.”

Without putting too fine a point on things, this is the best news Australia’s miners have had since the dreaded Resource Super Tax news of May 2, 2010, hit the press. In fact, Rudd has subsequently provided many an astonishing headline, provoking extremely outspoken opinion and upset  from some of the world’s mining industry figureheads, and I think it’s fair to say that the last month-and-a-bit has been no short of a disaster.

In our latest issue, released just last night, we tackle the tax head on and little news could be more welcome than this notice of Rudd’s timely departure today. The ends have not justified the means in his tax reform plan. Yes, he is/was working to fix Australia’s taxation system and yes, something still needs to be done. But messing with mining; the nation’s backbone? I think not.

I wish Gillard all the luck in the world with cleaning up this mess and bringing real tax reform to Australia. It is important to look upon this as an opportunity for great improvement, not a mud-slinging contest as Rudd backs away. The nation excels in many industries, especially mining, so let’s focus on what the strengths are. Perhaps this is the beginning of the end to the super tax debacle? One can only hope….

As the news buzz worldwide is filled with the sound of vuvuzela’s and everyone turns their attentions to the World Cup in South Africa, the George Media team have thrown our hats into the ring and despite yours truly drawing Algeria in the office sweepstakes —seriously conflicting any sense of support for my native England ahead of tonight’s game—everyone is having a ball.

In order to tie in the tournament to all-things IRJ now is a good time to look beyond what is happening on the pitches and enjoy the dramatic backdrop for tonight’s game at Cape Town’s Green Point Stadium: Rustenburg’s  Magaliesberg mountains. They are some of the oldest in the world and span 120 kilometres from Pretoria’s Bronkhorstspruit Dam in the east, over to Rustenburg. They also play host to platinum mining which provides employment and industry to the locality.

The Magaliesberg mountains are a perfect example of the country behind the football frenzy, and the concerns regarding vital energy, industry and infrastructural investments which will still be around once the teams have picked up their kits and gone home. To date, R17.5 billion has been spent on the five stadiums built and five others renovated to house this mass sporting event. When you consider that this is the same nation who just borrowed US$3.7 billion from the World Bank to build a new much-needed power plant, you can’t help but question the financials. Did no one think that this money could have gone to the national electricity provider, Eskom? Now we see reports that industrial action —in which two thirds of Eskom’s 32,000 staff may walk out— could threaten power cuts for the World Cup.

This sporting event has brought a promise of tourism and global focus to many, but at what cost today? It doesn’t make for popularity to highlight the real needs behind the beautiful game, but between Dutch beer companies storming seats with beautiful women and players touting mega sponsorship deals, it seems like madness that this hasn’t been given more coverage. By all means enjoy the match, but learning about the host country and appreciating it won’t hurt.

A U.S. government task force called the Flow Rate Technical Group released new estimates which ostensibly double the amount of oil being spewed out of a blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico. The task force’s new estimates suggest between 20,000 barrels and 40,000 barrels of oil may have spilled out daily before the well was partially contained.

Whether it is 400 barrels or 40,000 barrels or more, which it very likely will end up being, the potential damage is frightening. What is more frightening still, is the very obvious prioritization on the part of BP to cover up the evidence of the damage ( by withholding video of the oil well for weeks ) over getting any and all relevant information to sciences as quickly as possible.

Back in April, when George Media attended the G8/G20 Business Summit in Gatineau (coverage can be found at www.cbj.ca) I witnessed some of the most enlightened business leaders in the world present the reasons to do business, together. It took me some time to let the real impacts of this event sink in, but alas, here we are and I’m really coming to grips with the messages conveyed at the Summit—just in time for the Leaders’ Summits later this month.

Along with other politicians, Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper had the stage, for quite some time on the second day of events. Normally, Harper is a PM whom I’m fine to support—provided his platform is based on solid fact. For the most part, he did a great job in Gatineau. Harper was quick to illustrate, during his panel discussion with John Manley and Perrin Beatty, that Canadian society is just as well-balanced as its economy.

However, much to my chagrin, he also made a very contentious general statement about Canadian society. I count this as a massive PR mistake, despite the fact that I was likely one of only two or three people that took issue with Harper’s statement (if they heard it).

“I think something has to be said about the Canadian society itself. It’s not that we try to tell our foreign visitors that this country is perfect, but Canada has, in a sense, the first truly globalized population. It is a country where we have people from every background, for the most part successfully integrated, and we have none of the deep social tensions and cleavages that mark so many other societies” Harper said—surely much to the disappointment of anyone in the audience of First Nations origin, or anyone from Quebec. I’m sure there were other audience members who felt alienated…but who am I to say anything? I just think whoever prepped him did a half-baked job.

I had to ask myself, more than a few times, did he really just say that? Stay tuned for an article in CBJ about social tension and how it affects business relationships.

In the meantime, discuss.

Here I was, sitting at my desk trying to articulate for our readers how frustrating it is that no-one has really measured the amount of oil spilled off of the Gulf of Mexico in the last few weeks (one of the PR mistakes in this disaster), but I thought I’d point to another blog about this very same topic, which illustrates the exact point that bothers me.

Felix Salmon, a writer with Reuters, puts it perfectly when he says “So let’s get down there and measure this thing” since no-one has really reported a true figure of barrels of oil spilled.

Felix asks “Why release a point estimate? Well, if the NOAA had released a range — say 3,000 to 30,000 barrels a day — then the press would have gravitated to the higher number, and talked about a spill of “as much as 30,000 barrels a day” – which, true to his thoughts, is exactly what the media is going to do.

No matter which way you flip it, this is all very, very bad. And a difference of a couple of zeros isn’t going to change public perception that someone needs to pay for this accident.

See Felix’s piece:

http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2010/05/14/lies-damn-lies-and-oil-spill-statistics.

As the UK parliamentary election rollercoaster grinds, or rather smashes, to a halt, both the IRJ London and Toronto offices have been chatting about the influx of damning and dooming media reports flooding in.  Speaking to editor over at the American Business Journal, Antonia McGuire, it was interesting to hear that the Canadian press, “made it sound quite catastrophic.” On this side of the pond, reports took a different approach, with some election commentary indicating a hung parliament for a while now.
Aside from the fact that some polling stations were so ill-equipped that valuable potential voters were left queuing in the cold unable to take part, a lot of this entire campaign has appeared to be orchestrated in a manner that I can only describe as, well, ‘British’. Even now, as the process of allegiances, shot calling and blaming plays out, things run along in a rather civilised manner. That is, according to some stories. When people speak of ‘the media’ as one enormous and often sinister monolith, I can’t help but wince. I wonder if it is possible to apply standards and to regulate this force, but also to understand the canyon between tabloids, bias blogging, empty press releases, broadsheet reporting and investigative or ‘free press’ text.
Another great example of the wild scale we see in reporting has to be BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig explosion and subsequent major oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico. Every angle from the millions upon millions BP will lose, to the wildlife, to offshore development in the future, needs to be picked apart and made sense of and in doing so not every writer will be on the same page. Ultimately, be it the elections, the oil slick or the old ‘cat stuck up a tree’ analogy for a fluffy story, opinion is a tricky visitor to keep out of reporting.

In this recent election, there is as much to be enjoyed by way of media critique, as there is in reading a story to your liking and wholeheartedly believing every word. Whilst sensational reporting is a necessary evil of free speech and the written word – you catch more flies with sugar, after all – ensuring that those words are read knowingly and a full spectrum of reports are available, is surely extremely important. It’s not what we read, it’s how we read it.

News of the oil slick at British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico, off of the coast of Louisiana, just keeps getting worse doesn’t it?
Last Thursday, April 22, reports talked of emotional reunions between stranded rig workers and their respective families, and said that although those 11 people (now presumed dead) were missing, the rescue effort was due to continue until every iota of hope had been exhausted.

By Monday April 26, BP hauled in Development Driller III; the secondary rig intended to assist in the clean-up alongside what remained of the burning Deepwater Horizon.

“We are attacking this spill on two fronts — at the wellhead and on the surface offshore,” Tony Hayward, CEO for BP, told press as news emerged that 400 square-miles was now festooned by the leaking oil.

“The team on the ground and those at sea have the group’s full resources behind them.”

This was about the point where hopes for recovering the missing 11 alive began to fade, and by Tuesday, April 27, the news continued to reveal equally gloomy developments. BP posted US$5.6 billion cost profits for the first quarter 2010, a fantastic surging result on the US$2.4 billion for 2009, however unfortunately swathed by the tragedy which continued to unfold. Speculation swirled over how these sorts of profit increases might suffer under the weight of the accident.

On Wednesday April 28, the notion of controlled burning or, “setting the sea on fire,” sparked off and investigations as to whether this might be the answer BP are looking for began. Unfortunately the next day, on Thursday April 29, damning aerial photographs revealed that a second leak existed, capable of making the accident five times worse than originally thought. The United States Coastguard announced that 5,000 barrels per day are flowing into the offshore location.

Today, the weight of a fortnight of tragic and trying news is on BP’s shoulders. Industries spokespeople are voicing their deep concerns (if they haven’t already) and what was originally deemed to be a terrible, yet containable, accident, now appears to have truly taken on a life of its own.

It appears that there’s no knowing if, and when, some semblance of a conclusion will take place. Latest reports state that the oil has shown up on shore around the mouth of the Mississippi river. It is time to question just how terrible and far-reaching this accident might prove to be, as the time for denial and down-playing has long passed.