British oil giant BP made its first foray into Brazil by injecting $7 billion for assets owned by Devon Energy (DVN). PBR has had tremendous success there and BP wants a piece of the pie.
It’s cheaper to drill for oil on the floor of the New York stock exchange than on land or sea, and I still think we will see more M&A related activity in the energy sector going forward.
World stock markets are trending in a narrow range this morning amid growing concerns of an overheating Chinese economy and as investors await more U.S. economic data over the rest of the week for further insights into the state of the U.S. economic recovery.
The S&P is up about nine days in a row and the financials, which are finally leading the market higher are up the same, but the latter has logged gains for about 20 of the last 23 sessions. The depth and breadth of this market has been terrific and barring an “event” we could glide higher as we dance with the 1150 level. A pullback is overdue, but so many investors are saying that so it may not happen just yet.
P.S. Private equity has $500 billion burning a hole in its pocket, the highest levels seen since 2003.
Thursday, March 11, 2010