Anyone care if China buys a US oil company?
 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/csm/20050718/ts_csm/aoily

Given it's size, does it really matter?

Or do you take the stand that once 1 of them gets sold to China, others will soon follow.

A precedent should be set IMHO.

What say you?

THey are trying to secure the oil in the asian brim...does anyone think these guys won't keep it all for themselves?

"There lies a sleeping giant,which when awakened will frighten the world"

Napoleon Bonaparte, 1809.

Unocal represents 0.8 percent of US oil production, and 0.3 percent of consumption. Even if Beijing took all that petroleum for itself, the move would lessen the amount of petroleum that China would have to buy on the world market. The net effect on prices thus would be zero, according to Jerry Taylor, director of natural resource studies at the Cato Institute.

Much ado? Or is it because we only preach capitalism if it favors "u.s."?

True. As we spread capitalism around the world, we have to remind ourselves that others will soon do as we do.

Think of how many corporations the Saudis have invested in.

I know Citigroup is largely owned by some Saudis.

What's the differene if we let the Chinese buy an oil company outright as opposed the Saudis owning a large share of Citigroup.

I think we'd be more hurt in the short term if the Saudis divested themselves of their Citigroup stock that Chine buying a small oil company.

Perhaps long term, having them own several oil companies would not be the wisest thing that could happen.

.02

Let them buy it.

Remember when Japan, Inc was gonna own America?

That's one possible future for China.

Anybody watching the Tour de France? What happens when some hotshot challenges the old guy on Team Discovery?

Problem is there is vast differences between Japan and China...

they buy on oil company today..another tomorrow, then another then the sate who owns it keeps it for their own use....then instead of a bunch of Arabs trying to run our lives you have the Chinese....

Different product, different govermental philosophy.

What happened to the USSR? They had an, uh, divestiture and corporate break-up.

A free market will always kick a controlled market's ass.

Bot

Here's an idea . . . we can pull a "Rupert Murdoch" on them . . . require anyone purchasing more than one refinery company must be a U.S. citizen . . . (Murdoch became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1985 to satisfy the legal requirement that only United States citizens could own American television stations) . . . we'd gain billions of new citizens and a huge manufacturing base . . . :D

What is the worst thing that could happen if they bought Unocal? I mean worst thing for the USA.

I can't see a downside.

Bot

Best thing to do right now is invest in energy based stocks. Whatever happens, lots of money will be moving around in that industry.

This reminds me of the heated discussions that went around about 10 years ago when a Japanese company wanted to buy the Seattle Mariners.

"It's sacriligious (sp?). Baseball is as traditional American as you can get! We can't let the japs get in!"


Well the Japanese bought the Mariners and now you see more and more Asians in professional sports.

Sounds like an improvement to me. The lesser of two evils, for sure.

Mike

We don’t seem to have a problem with them buying our bonds every month. Unocal sells oil they produce in Alaska to the Japanese, and what they produce in the South China Sea never leaves Asia. We make investments in China, so the real rub is if we tell them they can’t buy here they just might back away from the bond auction or even dump US Bonds to support their currency that we’re so insistent they let go high - if they haven’t started already. Then maybe when the secret of why long-term rates are so magically low gets out we’ll understand an old lesson that Baron Rothschild taught the king of Germany long ago. He who controls the interest rate rules.