By Christian Schmollinger April 15 (Bloomberg) -- China?s...

By Christian Schmollinger
April 15 (Bloomberg) -- China?s national oil companies are
likely to target Australian natural gas assets in 2011 through
purchases of stakes in projects, according to Wood Mackenzie.
Chinese companies may buy stakes to access about 49.4
million metric tons a year of unsold gas supply from projects in
Australia, Edinburgh-based Wood Mackenzie, an energy consultant,
said in a report released today. PetroChina Co., China?s biggest
energy company, has about $40 billion in cash to fund
acquisitions this year, Simon Flowers, head of upstream
corporate analysis, said in an interview yesterday.
?The principal opportunity for these national oil
companies will be Australia,? Flowers said at Wood Mackenzie?s
office in Singapore. ?There is still scope for some of the
projects with unsold gas. To help the Chinese companies come to
a decision on whether to buy the gas, the project can offer an
equity stake.?
China?s energy companies, including Cnooc Ltd., China
Petroleum & Chemical Corp. and PetroChina, spent $45 billion on
60 agreements last year, according to data compiled by
Bloomberg. China Petroleum, or Sinopec, made the biggest
acquisitions, disbursing $12.29 billion.
?In the past year we?ve seen Sinopec and Cnooc being very
active in North America and that could quite easily continue
with them both doing further deals,? Flowers said. ?The
sleeping giant is PetroChina and its parent, which we believe
has about $40 billion of capital but has been largely absent
while the other companies have been busy.?

PetroChina Awakes

PetroChina may have stepped up its expansion. The company
on Feb. 10 announced a $5.4 billion agreement with Canada?s
Encana Corp. to buy half the Cutbank Ridge gas assets, the
company?s largest overseas purchase to date.
Chinese buyers are unlikely to purchase whole Australian
companies with large natural gas reserves such as Woodside
Petroleum Ltd. or Santos Ltd. in order to avoid any political
conflicts, Flowers said.
?What these companies want is long-term reserves,?
Flowers said. ?However, it?s not been the style of the Chinese
national oil companies to buy ever since Cnooc got knocked
back.?
Cnooc?s attempted $18.5 billion purchase of Unocal Corp. in
2005 was blocked by opposition from U.S. lawmakers. The company
was eventually bought by Chevron Corp.
?What we?ve seen increasing evidence of globally is to
look for long-term reserves and to expand internationally but to
do it through minority interests and strategic partnerships on
assets,? Flowers said.


Hmmmm. large long term gas supplies......BPT, ADE in the cooper comes to mind.