Mayor of Budapest Gabor Demszky said on Sunday he would not resign over the scandals surrounding Budapest transport company BKV.
“I will take political responsibility but will not please my opponents by stepping down,” Demszky told an evening programme of commercial TV2.
BKV’s affairs must be investigated in collaboration with police, Demszky said. Asked about the type of advisory contracts which are questioned at the company, Demszky said these were so wide-ranging that it is impossible to give an example.
In general, he added, it can be said that “they signed contracts in a chaotic way for every possible thing”.
Hungary’s main opposition Fidesz party on Thursday said Demszky should resign over scandals at BKV. Demszky claimed earlier that he had first heard about the scandal from the press and had no knowledge of the many suspected fraudulent contracts over which three former BKV leaders have been arrested.
So here are the alternatives:
Either Demszky is a liar
or he is a complete asshole who doesn’t know what goes on in his office …
Any bets ?
FarkasLászlo.
Exxon Mobil Corp (XOM.N) and MOL announced earlier this month that they purchased part of Falcon Oil’s (FO.V) stake in the Mako Trough.
After the deal, MOL said Exxon Mobil and MOL each controlled 40.44 percent of the Mako Trough, while Falcon Oil held 19.12 percent.
Falcon Oil has been exploring the region for years and discovered natural gas, but said it was unusually hot, very deep below the surface and required unconventional technologies to produce it.
It also needs more gas wells than conventional sources and is more expensive to produce.
MOL said the entire gas field would need around 2,000 gas wells and around 50 wells could be drilled per year.
“These gas wells are deeper, more complicated and produce significantly less (than a conventional field),” Attila Holoda, MOL’s European upstream director said.
The cost of drilling one well was seen at between $8 million and $12 million, while ground infrastructure was estimated to cost between $22 million and $28 million.
Once production is under way, the costs are estimated at around $2 to $3 per barrel of oil equivalent.
“If production is successful, by 2015 we could be producing as much unconventional gas in Hungary as conventional gas,” Aldott said.
Thanks for the information Gasline. Keep it up and let us know if you see anything new, in either english or hungarian.
It was interesting and valuable for you to furnish some information as to the cost structure of the drilling and the product. Costs of $2-3 a barrel are sustainable when you have the product trading at historically high prices. Right now, crude oil futures are trading at around $75 per barrel at the New York Merchantile Exchange. (May delivery) That is way off the freakish highs it had over $140, but still far above the average historical price when compared over 30 years.
Now of course we can’t know where these energies will be trading in the next few years when the Makó production comes due, be it 2012 or 2015. (Investment in a company like MOL should be a long term strategy.) Projections assume that continuing economic growth in India and China will keep driving demand and prices up over time.
What throws a weird kink into the whole picture is the possibility that the majors may escape taxation by the Hungarian government. That should add quite a nice incentive to their cost/benefit analysis! Again, this is the kind of crap they could never get away with in their home nations or in any more developed country.
A thief made off with a handbag stuffed with 4.5 million euros in jewels belonging to the daughter of the mayor of Kiev while she was on a visit to Paris on Monday, a judicial source said.
http://www.eubusiness.com/news-eu/france-ukraine.2pj/
Could this also happen to Demszky’s daughter ?
4.5 million Euros worth of jewels in her handbag? Jeezus. The daughter of a town mayor. Typical third world style kleptocracy. It only makes you wonder what the size of the father’s fortune is. I can’t say that I feel very sorry for the woman. Some thief administered proletarian justice.
@Farkas László.
Herewith a little bit more info.
There are developments in the background which are coming together slowly but surely.
I’m sure you have a greater understanding of what’s happening than me.
I will continue to post. But please do a summary,
say, once a week. Thanks.
Who’s behind the XTO-Exxon merge? The Russians.
It’s not quite “Tear down this wall,” but the Russian bear can only play hardball with natural gas and its neighbors before the free market brings a response.
While ExxonMobil’s announcement that it’s buying Fort Worth’s XTO Energy for $31 billion and $10 billion in debt is a rousing cheer for US shale producers, the real stimulus has been Russia’s annual bully-thy-neighbor approach to winter gas supplies.
Exxon made no bones Monday it was buying XTO for its expertise in cracking shale gas plays, with plans to export that talent to the nearly 3 million acres of shale leasehold it has in Poland, Hungary, and Germany. CEO Rex Tillerson almost salivated at the prospect of producing gas smack in the middle of a gas-hungry market (same dynamics as Pennsylvania’s Marcellus Shale and a little town called New York City).
Making that market roar, however, will be giving Eastern European consumers a stab at freedom from the nearly annual turn-ons and shut-offs of natural gas supplies from Russia via Ukraine.
Last month, Gazprom said US shale gas would have no effect on its plans to import Russian LNG to the states. ExxonMobil is about to find out if Hungarian-German-Polish gas will have an effect on Gazprom.
Why in the world are you talking about Exxon and Mol in a thread about Demszky and BKV? Wolfie, I would take both sides of that bet.