Germany says Russia may be playing role in east Ukraine tensions

BERLIN, April 14 Mon Apr 14, 2014 5:56am EDT

BERLIN, April 14 (Reuters) - Russia may be playing a behind-the-scenes role in escalating tensions in eastern Ukraine, a German foreign ministry spokeswoman said on Monday.

"We have numerous sources that suggest Russia may be playing a role in the clashes," the spokeswoman told a government news conference.

Separately, a government spokeswoman said European Union foreign ministers meeting in Luxembourg on Monday would discuss whether tensions in eastern Ukraine justified the implementation of tougher "third phase" economic sanctions against Russia.

"Whether the current situation in Ukraine is reason to move to the third phase of scanctions will be discussed by EU foreign ministers this afternoon," the second spokeswoman said. (Reporting by Michelle Martin and Erik Kirschbaum; Writing by Noah Barkin)

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UPDATE 2-Total goes ahead with $16 bln Angolan Kaombo oil project

Mon Apr 14, 2014 6:00am EDT

* Decision made after costs cut from $20 bln

* Project to pump 230,000 barrels/day, start in 2017

* Project seen as key for Angola to replace older fields (Adds quotes, analysts, details on cuts, background on Angola targets)

By Natalie Huet and Shrikesh Laxmidas

PARIS/LUANDA, April 14 (Reuters) - France's Total said it had decided to go ahead with the Kaombo oil project offshore Angola after reducing its cost by $4 billion to $16 billion, an advance that could help Angola keep up oil output over the long run.

The decision to invest in the ultra-deep sea project, which has been repeatedly delayed because of its cost, is seen as important for Africa's No. 2 oil producer to replace older fields and hit its production targets.

In recent years, a number of other large-scale projects around the world have fallen victim as oil companies have reduced global investment and returned cash to shareholders.

"Total has significantly optimized the project's design and contracting strategy in recent months. Kaombo illustrates both the group's capital discipline and objective to reduce capex," Yves-Louis Darricarrere, Total's president for upstream, said in a statement on Monday.

Half of the cuts came from a reassessment of the project's specifications, using a "'just good enough' approach rather than 'the best possible'," Arnaud Breuillac, the company's exploration and production chief, told Platts on Friday.

The company decided, for example, to build its two 115,000 barrels-per-day (bpd) floating production storage and offloading units by making alterations to two very large crude carriers (VLCCs) instead of building them from scratch, he added.

These units will have a shorter lifespan than purpose-built ones, which could last up to 35 years, but using the converted VLCCs and other less bespoke equipment could save $2 billion.

It is saving another $1 billion by agreeing with the government to cut the number of work hours done on the project locally, because the rates are more expensive in Angola than elsewhere.

The project in Block 32 is scheduled to start up in 2017, when it will have a production capacity of 230,000 bpd, the French oil company said.

"Globally, deep water costs are rising - this year by almost 20 percent, so the fact that Total could find slack in its capex to continue with its Angola project shows how investors view Angola's longer-term offshore prospects," said Rolake Akinkugbe, head of energy and natural resources coverage at FBN Capital.

"By and large, they are bullish."

In a similar move last year, Britain's BP scrapped bespoke plans to develop its Mad Dog 2 project in the Gulf of Mexico, opting instead for a repeatable model it had used before. BP said it thought the old model could recover 90 percent as much oil at a fraction of the cost.

Total is already the top operator in Angola, with equity production of 186,000 bpd, mainly due to its Girassol, Dalia and Pazflor deepwater fields in the huge Block 17. The blocks it operates produce a total of 600,000 bpd, over a third of the country's output.

Total also confirmed on Monday that it was on track to start output at the CLOV project in Block 17, which will have a production capacity of 160,000 bpd in mid-2014.

REPLACING OLDER FIELDS

"With the investments it is making in Blocks 17 and 32, it will be very difficult for any other oil company to overtake Total as the leading operator in Angola," said Jose de Oliveira, head of the Energy Nucleus at Luanda's Catholic University.

Angola wants to increase production to 2 million bpd next year from 1.73 million bpd in 2013 and then maintain that level for five years.

Still, analysts say the country's plans to ramp up production have proven more challenging than expected due to technical problems and declines at older fields.

Credit rating agency Fitch on Thursday revised Angola's outlook to stable from positive, citing challenges to the oil sector as one of the main drivers behind the decision.

"Kaombo is very important if Angola wants to put production at 2 million bpd, because output at some of the older fields, namely in blocks 14 and 15, is declining," Oliveira said.

Total and Angolan state-owned firm Sonangol each hold 30 percent stakes in Block 32, while Angolan-Chinese joint venture Sonangol Sinopec International has 20 percent, Exxon Mobil's Esso unit 15 percent and Portugal's Galp 5 percent.

The Kaombo project is located about 260 km (162 miles) off Luanda in water depths of 1,400 to 1,900 metres (4,600-6,200 ft).

Total shares were up slightly at 47.835 euros at 1000 GMT. (Additional reporting by Michel Rose; editing by Andrew Callus and Jane Baird)

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UPDATE 1-National Bank of Greece moves ahead with share sale plan

Mon Apr 14, 2014 6:20am EDT

* Goldman and Morgan Stanley hired to manage sale -sources

* National Bank aims to raise up to 2.5 billion euros

* Confidence in Greece returning, 2013 budget targets met (Adds background, budget data)

By George Georgiopoulos

ATHENS, April 14 (Reuters) - National Bank of Greece is moving ahead with plans for a share offering to bolster its capital, two senior bankers familiar with the issue told Reuters on Monday.

Greece's biggest lender, which must plug a 2.18 billion euro ($3.03 billion) capital shortfall under the terms of the country's international bailout, has picked Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley as global coordinators for the equity offering, the bankers said.

"A management board meeting has been called for tomorrow to discuss the plan, which will likely raise up to 2.5 billion euros," one of the bankers said.

The offering is unlikely to include pre-emption rights for existing shareholders, the banker added.

A senior National Bank executive had told Reuters at the weekend that the bank was considering an equity sale, sending its shares down 14 percent by 1008 GMT on Monday, the biggest faller on the FTSEurofirst 300 index.

National Bank delined to comment, but it had previously said it would not resort to an equity issue to plug the capital gap and would instead focus on cost cuts and the sale of non-core assets.

On Friday central bank chief George Provopoulos encouraged National Bank to follow the example of peers Piraeus Bank , Alpha Bank and Eurobank by seeking to tap capital markets.

Provopoulos's statement came after Greece's bailed-out government returned to bond markets last week after a four-year exile, raising 3 billion euros in a sign of growing investor confidence in the country.

Greece, which has been bailed out twice by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) since 2010, is likely to obtain further debt relief after its statistics agency ELSTAT confirmed on Monday that the government has met its 2013 budget targets. ($1 = 0.7201 Euros) (Writing by Harry Papachristou; Editing by David Goodman)

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Chad in talks with IMF on $130 mln loan program-minister

WASHINGTON, April 12 Sat Apr 12, 2014 7:38pm EDT

WASHINGTON, April 12 (Reuters) - Chad is negotiating a new loan program with the International Monetary Fund totaling about $130 million and hopes to conclude discussions in the second half of the year, the country's finance minister said on Saturday.

Bedoumra Kordje, minister for finance and budget, said Chad was seeking a so-called Extended Credit Facility from the IMF, which had proposed an amount of about 60 billion CFA francs ($127 million) for the program.

The landlocked central African country, one of the continent's poorest, has seen strong growth over the past decade as it emerged as an oil producer.

Chad had also been involved in two peacekeeping operations - in neighboring Mali and Central African Republic, though it decided to withdraw its troops from the CAR earlier this month.

"There were delays (in the discussions with the IMF), but that was due to the exceptional situation," Kordje said at a press conference of African finance ministers at the IMF-World Bank meetings in Washington.

The extended credit facility is a longer-term IMF program available for poor countries with protracted balance of payments problems. Chad had already had its policies especially monitored by the IMF under a Staff Monitored Program, which has no money attached and ended in December.

Kordje also reiterated that Chad expects to see double-digit growth this year.

"This allows us to look at the future with optimism," he said. ($1 = 472.3360 CFA Francs) (Reporting by Anna Yukhananov; Editing by Andrea Ricci)

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Australia says progress towards G20 growth target "unacceptable"

Sat Apr 12, 2014 10:55pm EDT

PERTH, Australia, April 13 - Slow progress towards meeting economic growth targets set by the Group of 20 bloc of advanced and developing nations this year is "unacceptable", Australian Treasurer Joe Hockey said on Sunday.

G20 finance ministers had pledged to have "real and effective plans to lift the global economy by a further 2 percent" before they meet in Australia in September but were only one-tenth of the way there, he said.

"The proposals put forward by nations so far have been unacceptable and they only meet 10 percent of our goal," Hockey told Australian Broadcasting Corp. TV after talks in Washington.

Hockey coordinated the talks, with Australia holding the G20 presidency.

The agreement by the G20 nations at a meeting in Sydney in February to lift their collective GDP by more than 2 percent above what current economic policies would achieve over the next five years was reiterated in a statement on Friday.

The statement acknowledged the political difficulties in making changes to reach that goal.

"There was a very frank discussion about the fact that they need to be real and new commitments," Hockey said.

"It's not good enough for some countries just to reheat previous announcements. You need to actually really do the heavy lifting," he said.

G20 members represent around 85 per cent of global gross domestic product, more than over 75 percent of global trade, and two-thirds of the world's population.

Finance ministers from the bloc will meet in the tropical Australian city of Cairns in September before a summit of G20 leaders in Brisbane in November.

During the talks in Washington, Hockey was also deeply critical of delays in implementing changes agreed by the G20 bloc in 2010 for reform of the International Monetary Fund.

The reforms would give more power to emerging markets such as Brazil and China and increase the IMF's resources.

Hockey blamed an impasse in the U.S. Congress for the delay, saying it "diminishes America's global standing instead of enhancing it". (Reporting by Morag MacKinnon; Editing by Paul Tait)

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Reforms to IMF hit serious deadlock - G20 official

Sun Apr 13, 2014 2:14am EDT

* G20 gives U.S. until year-end to ratify reforms to the Fund

* IMF quota reforms would give emerging power greater say

By Lidia Kelly

WASHINGTON, April 13 (Reuters) - Reforms to the International Monetary Fund have hit a deadlock despite a declaration from global financial chiefs that they would move forward without the United States if it fails to ratify the changes by year-end, a G20 official said on Sunday.

The inability to proceed with giving emerging markets a more powerful voice at the IMF and shoring up the lender's resources appeared the most contentious issue for officials from the Group of 20 leading economies and the representatives for all IMF member nations who met over the weekend.

In a final communique, G20 finance ministers and central bankers said they were "deeply disappointed" with the U.S. delay.

"Some said that we need to give the U.S. more space," the official, who participated in the G20 talks and spoke on conditions of anonymity, said. "I say we are at a dead end."

Any attempt to break the package of reforms, proposed by the G20 in 2010, would be disastrous not only for the United States, but for the whole group, he said, because most countries have already gone through the ratification procedures.

"If you pull the 2010 package apart, you will have to start anew," the official said. "And this factor cannot be overcome. How to overcome it? Nobody wants to go again through this process for the second time."

Other officials were not immediately available for comment.

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE?

Emerging markets, most handicapped by the lack of reforms, expressed exasperation over the weekend that a four-year wait for the reforms is asking too much of them. But it is unclear what moves could be taken to overcome the impasse.

There could be some ad hoc measures taken to achieve at least some of the governance overhaul for the global lender without formal U.S. approval. Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said developing nations may demand changes to the IMF's emergency borrowing mechanism if the United States does not approve the overhaul.

Most of the solutions, however, giving the structure of decision making at the IMF, could not be implemented without the U.S. approval. U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew said President Barack Obama's administration would do its best to push IMF quota reforms through the U.S. Congress this year.

Christine Lagarde, managing director of the IMF, said it is too early to talk about alternatives.

"Plan A is going to be explored to the end, and in depth, but if that plan A doesn't work, then we will worry about plan B."

For now, the G20 official said, there is no plan B.

"There is nowhere to go," he said. "Initially, you have a discussion, but then when you move to details, there is nothing."

The impasse in the reforms has already had some side effects, including the increase in regional funds that act on a smaller scale, but which altogether could potentially undermine the role of the IMF in the future.

At the G20 meeting over the weekend, officials tried to stay optimistic that the U.S., despite complaints from some Republicans have that the changes would cost too much at a time Washington was running big budget deficits, will come forward.

But the prospects are not promising, the G20 official said.

"It is impossible to defend national interests, and we are all forced to do so, and not offer a breakthrough solution that would respond to current needs," he said.

"At a time when the world has become multi-polar, why should one country should have the veto power?" (Additinal reporting by Anna Yukhananov; Editing by Robert Birsel)

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UPDATE 3-Brazilian tycoon Batista faces insider trading probes

Fri Apr 11, 2014 9:03pm EDT

(Adds comment from Batista; OGX and OSX decline to comment; paragraphs 7-8)

By Jeb Blount and Juliana Schincariol

RIO DE JANEIRO, April 11 (Reuters) - Eike Batista, who was Brazil's richest man for most of the past decade, is under investigation for allegedly engaging in insider trading while he chaired his now-bankrupt oil-producing and shipbuilding firms, securities industry watchdog CVM said on Friday.

In a statement sent to Reuters, Rio de Janeiro-based CVM confirmed that Batista is a respondent in six of nine probes that executives of his Grupo EBX conglomerate are facing for breaching securities rules. In two of them, regulators are examining whether Batista allegedly took advantage of his access to privileged information.

CVM also listed a dozen probes questioning financial and other data unveiled by oil company Óleo and Gás Participações SA , formerly known as OGX, and four more firms he controlled through EBX. If the probes lead to criminal charges against Batista, it would be yet another major blow to a businessman once hailed as Brazil's model entrepreneur and a symbol of its economic success.

"If this turns out to be true it will be excellent news for investors who lost so much with OGX," said Rodrigo Bornholdt, a partner with Bornholdt Advogados in Joinville, Brazil, which has been organizing minority shareholders for a lawsuit against OGX. "This would make it much easier for them to sue Batista, the corporate directors and the company."

The demise of his energy, logistics and mining empire, which two years ago was valued at about $60 billion, ended up in OGX filing in October for Latin America's largest bankruptcy.

Under CVM regulations, Batista could face fines and be banned from running a listed company. But he could also face criminal prosecution - which could put him in jail for as many as five years - and separate civil penalties if individual investors and companies sue him for damages, Bornholdt added.

EBX, speaking on behalf of Batista, issued a statement denying any wrongdoing. Batista did not make use of privileged information or act in bad faith, the statement said, adding that he will explain his decisions to the CVM.

Representatives for Oleo and Gas and OSX declined to comment.

According to a Valor Econômico newspaper report on Friday, CVM wants to determine whether Batista also withheld information that was unfavorable to some of his business while encouraging investors to buy more stock in his companies. During that time, Batista sold shares of OGX, as well as its sister company and shipbuilder OSX Brasil SA.

Valor, which had access to the content of the probes, also said Óleo e Gás waited at least 10 months to inform shareholders that four oil fields were not commercially viable.

'IDIOTPROOF'

Some of the luster that helped bring hundreds of billions of dollars into Brazil in the past decade, partly because of Batista's meteoric rise, is gone. Like his promises of fast and "idiotproof" returns in his various commodity and logistic ventures, Brazil's economic boom has since fizzled into four consecutive years of mediocre growth.

The bankruptcies of OGX and OSX could have also helped weigh down on confidence in Brazil's capital markets at a time of sluggish growth, executives such as Edemir Pinto, the chief executive of financial bourse BM&FBovespa SA, said a few months ago.

OGX shares have lost 99 percent of their value since 2010 and are no longer a component of Brazil's Bovespa index. OSX, which is also seeking bankruptcy protection, is entirely reliant on OGX for revenue.

In a filing on July 1, 2013, OGX said the Tubarão Azul, Tubarão Gato, Tubarão Tigre and Tubarão Areia fields were not commercially viable, kicking off the long decline of EBX.

Some of the ongoing probes showed Batista, whose companies are mostly in bankruptcy proceedings or have been sold, had access to information that was not communicated to the market when he sold shares of OGX and the shipbuilder before July 1, possibly in violation of Brazil's rules on using privileged information, according to the newspaper.

Batista still controls Oleo and Gas and is its chairman. In February, the company presented a plan to a Rio de Janeiro judge to restructure and cede control to creditors owed $5.8 billion.

The CVM has decided to give Batista until May 14 to defend himself against allegations of insider trading and price manipulation, the government's official gazette said on Tuesday.

The Valor article said Batista and OGX executives had suspected the amount of recoverable oil in the fields was smaller than initially expected since 2011.

In September of 2012, board members were presented with a study by a Brazilian unit of Schlumberger NV, the world's largest oilfield service company, that confirmed drilling those areas would not yield a profit under any scenario, Valor said.

At the time, Batista explained his 2012 share sales as minor transactions to meet financial obligations he had with other investors.

CVM's insider trading case for OGX is under the code RJ2014-0578 and for OSX under the code RJ2013-13172. (Reporting by Jeb Blount and Juliana Schicariol; Additional reporting by Caroline Stauffer and Marcela Ayres in São Paulo; Editing by Steve Orlofsky, Guillermo Parra-Bernal, Bernard Orr Mohammad Zargham)

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Armed men seize police department in east Ukraine

MOSCOW, April 12 Sat Apr 12, 2014 3:29am EDT

MOSCOW, April 12 (Reuters) - Several armed men have seized a police department in the eastern Ukrainian city of Slaviansk, Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said in a Facebook post on Saturday.

"Armed men in camouflage uniforms seized the police department in Slaviansk. The response will be very tough because there is a difference between protesters and terrorists," Avakov said, giving no further details. (Reporting by Pavel Polityuk; Writing by Alessandra Prentice; Editing by Christian Lowe)

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UPDATE 1-Armed men seize police department in east Ukraine:minister

Sat Apr 12, 2014 6:57am EDT

* Three government buildings now seized by pro-Moscow militants

* Pro-Western Kiev government promises tough response

* Protesters briefly hold part of Donetsk prosecutors office (Adds police in talks with attackers, new seizure in Donetsk)

By Gleb Garanich

SLAVIANSK, Ukraine, April 12 (Reuters) - At least 15 armed men seized police headquarters in the eastern Ukrainian city of Slaviansk on Saturday, extending takeovers of public building by pro-Russian militants who have been demanding autonomy from Kiev.

Government buildings in two other Russian-speaking cities, Donetsk and Luhansk, have been occupied by separatists since last weekend, in what the new pro-Europe leadership in Kiev says is part of a plan drawn up by the Kremlin to dismember Ukraine.

Russia annexed Ukraine's Russian-majority Crimea region last month after pro-Europe protesters toppled Kiev's Kremlin-backed president. Moscow denies having any designs on other regions of Ukraine but says Russian speakers there must be protected from possible persecution by the interim authorities in Kiev.

"Armed men in camouflage uniforms seized the police department in Slaviansk. The response will be very tough because there is a difference between protesters and terrorists," Interior Minister Arsen Avakov wrote on his Facebook.

A local police spokesman said it estimated 15-20 armed men had taken over the building in Slaviansk, in Ukraine's Donetsk region, about 150 km (93 miles) from the border with Russia.

Police were talking to the attackers, but they had not yet made any specific demands, he said.

Masked men in mismatched camouflage clothes armed with pistols and rifles stood near the building, a Reuters witness said. They were wearing orange and black ribbons, a symbol of the Soviet victory in World War Two that has been adopted by pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine.

A few hundred people gathered outside the three-storey building in a residential district near the centre of Slaviansk, a city of more than 100,000 inhabitants. Some in the crowd helped to build barricades from tires.

The militants in the Donetsk local government building and a security services building in Luhansk are pressing for a referendum on the future of the region.

The Ukrainian government says the takeovers could be part of a plan similar to that used by Russia to annex Crimea - the seizure of government buildings and military facilities was followed by a referendum on independence.

"I will say it again: those who want dialogue... will have dialogue and the search for solutions. Those who are up in arms, set fire to buildings, shoot at people, police, terrorise with bats and masks, these people will face an appropriate response," Avakov said in his Facebook post.

On Friday, a deadline set by the Kiev authorities for the protesters to end their occupations expired, but there was no sign of action from the Ukrainian police to force them out.

In Donetsk on Saturday, a group of around 40 young people armed with wooden bats briefly took over a floor of the general prosecutors office, barricading themselves in with furniture.

The protesters later agreed to leave following negotiations, Donetsk police said in a statement. (Additional reporting by Pavel Polityuk and Lina Kushch; Writing by Conor Humphries; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

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GLOBAL MARKETS-World equities hit two-week low as tech stocks retreat

Fri Apr 11, 2014 7:03am EDT

* MSCI World index falls 0.5 pct, MSCI Europe down 1.2 pct

* Sharp sell-off on Wall Street hits global stocks

* Tech shares suffer the most, valuations high

By Atul Prakash

LONDON, April 11 (Reuters) - Global equities slipped to a two-week low on Friday as a sell-off on Wall Street led by technology and biotech shares and triggered by growing concerns that valuations are over stretched spread to Asia and Europe.

With stocks out of favour, government bonds were set to benefit, with the yield on the benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note falling to its lowest since early March.

However, Greek 10-year government bond yields rose as investors booked profits on a strong rally in the run-up to the country's first debt sale since it defaulted two years ago.

The MSCI All-Country World index of shares fell 0.5 percent by 1024 GMT to its lowest level since late March, the MSCI Europe dropped 1.2 percent, while the STOXX Europe 600 index was down 1.3 percent.

That followed a 3.1 percent slide in the tech-heavy U.S. Nasdaq index on Thursday, the biggest drop in two-and-a-half years, and a 2.4 percent decline in Japan's Nikkei Average on Friday, the biggest weekly fall since the March 2011 tsunami and nuclear disaster.

"The sell-off in tech stocks in the United States, where gains were quite strong, is affecting other markets because the U.S. is still setting the tone for global markets," said Klaus Wiener, head of tactical asset allocation and chief economist at Generali Investments Europe, which manages $500 billion.

"But I don't think this is the start of a longer correction as the U.S. economy will gain further momentum. With key interest rates pinned to the zero-bound, we are still in a low-yield environment. Investors' hunger for yield will ensure that every time equity markets correct, demand will rise."

What increasingly looks like a major portfolio shift from momentum plays in U.S. technology and biotechnology stocks was having a knock-on effect across all regions and sectors, pressuring even defensive shares.

Momentum investing involves buying stocks that are already trending higher, often taking their price/earnings ratios into the stratosphere. When the momentum turns, prices can fall rapidly as investors rush to the exits.

"The sell-off is the result of increasing concerns about the future earnings growth," Christian Stocker, equity strategist at UniCredit in Munich, said. "Valuations are high compared to previous years and the trend of earnings estimates is very muted in the U.S. and almost flat in Europe."

DOLLAR FLAT, OIL SOFT

Technology stocks led the retreat in Europe, with the sector index, following its U.S. counterpart, down 2.4 percent on growing fears the shares have risen too far, too fast and are now relatively expensive compared with the broader market. The European healthcare index was down 1.8 percent.

The STOXX Europe 600 Technology index, which surged nearly 50 percent in two years to the end of December 2013, is down about 3 percent so far this year.

According to Thomson Reuters Datastream, the tech sector is the most expensive in Europe, trading at 19 times its 12-month forward earnings, against a 10-year average of about 16 times, and 14 times for the broader STOXX 600 index.

"It's a pre-Easter, pre-earnings season correction and represents an opportunity to invest in the value part of the stock market as the cyclical shares suffer from past hype," said Didier Duret, global chief investment officer at ABN-AMRO Private Banking.

The dollar stabilised after five sessions of losses against a basket of currencies. The dollar index was flat at 79.395, having hit a three-week low of 79.33 on Thursday. U.S. 10-year yields, which often correlate with the dollar, were last at 2.641 percent in Europe, the lowest in around a month.

On the commodities front, the recent fall in the dollar and weaker equities helped safe-haven gold to trade near its highest in 2-1/2 weeks and stay on track for its best week in a month.

Oil remained soft in the wake of Thursday's disappointing trade data from China and the prospect of increased supply. Brent crude fell 0.3 percent to $107.17 a barrel.

London nickel rose 2.3 percent to a 13-month high and headed for its ninth weekly gain in 10 weeks as a ban on ore exports from Indonesia fuelled prices of the metal, mainly used to produce stainless steel. (Additional reporting by Wayne Cole in Sydney; Editing by Catherine Evans)

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