With more than $110 billion of oil and gas assets on the block as companies big and small count the cost of the collapse in oil prices, it is now a question of who will blink first to set the M&A scramble in motion.
Article published by Reuters 30 Jan 2015 under the headline:
Buyers bide their time in $110 bln oil asset sell-off
* Half of the assets on sale are in North America
* North Sea could prove a hard sell
* Potential buyers holding out for further price falls
* Wave of deals expected within three to six months
By Ron Bousso
LONDON, Jan 30 (Reuters) – With more than $110 billion of oil and gas assets on the block as companies big and small count the cost of the collapse in oil prices, it is now a question of who will blink first to set the M&A scramble in motion.
Energy groups with spare cash, venture capital funds and multinational and state oil companies are eyeing assets with valuations that have largely tracked the halving of the oil price to less than $50 a barrel since last June.
Fri Jan 30, 2015 4:48pm GMT
This story is currently being reported by multiple Dutch news publishers on 31 Jan 2015
By John Donovan
From an article by Angela Macdonald-Smith published 30 Jan 2015 by The Sydney Morning Herald under the headline:
By Puneet Kollipara 
Potentially, a prolonged period of low oil prices might finally see BP and Shell, like two drunken sailors, holding each other up through the merger that has so long been on the horizon.
WASHINGTON Thu Jan 29, 2015 1:49pm EST
Royal Dutch Shell is reviving plans to drill for oil in Arctic in a move likely to intensify its battle with environmentalists.
By 
LONDON — Jan 29, 2015, 3:42 AM ET: 
BY PHUONG LE ASSOCIATED PRESS: 
AN OPEN LETTER TO MR EDWARD HEEREMA, FOUNDER AND SOLE OWNER OF ALLSEAS
FROM REUTERS
FROM BLOOMBERG
Krestia DeGeorge
There is a lot of media noise about one of the world’s largest ships, which is now in its finishing building stage in the port of Rotterdam. The ship is named Pieter Schelte after his father by the owner of the Allseas company Edward Heerema. So far so good. Allseas is an international player in the offshore industry and the Pieter Schelte will be used for pipe laying on the seabed and decommisioning of obsolete oil and gas platforms in for example the North Sea and Gulf of Mexico. However Jewish organisations are angry because the ship is named after a Dutch Nazi and SS-officer who was vehemently anti-Semitic (1).
FROM AN ARTICLE BY DANNY FORTSON OF THE SUNDAY TIMES PUBLISHED 25 JAN 2015 UNDER THE HEADLINE: 
By John Donovan
By GEOFF HO: Published Sunday January 25, 2015 
FROM AN ARTICLE BY ED VULLIAMY PUBLISHED BY THEGUARDIAN.COM AND THE OBSERVER NEWSPAPER, SUNDAY 25 JAN 2015 UNDER THE HEADLINE:
NON-PROFESSIONAL TRANSLATION OF AN ARTICLE PUBLISHED BY THE DUTCH
UPI ARTICLE BY AMY R. CONNOLLY PUBLISHED 24 JAN 2015
OPINION ARTICLE BY DANIEL YERGIN PUBLISHED IN PRINT BY THE NEW YORK TIMES ON SATURDAY 25 JAN 2015
From an article by 
Shell and the forerunner of BP bribed a famous politician to facilitate a merger 
By John Donovan
Article by 
“If unchecked, these pollutants can seriously impair the air we breathe, especially during summer months when they can reach higher levels. This settlement makes clear that if companies fail to produce fuels that comply with federal standards, they will be held accountable.”
Big Oil’s dividends look safe – for now
By John Donovan
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
MORE DETAILS:
A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
