Cracks appear in Russian oil edifice

Last Friday, the finishing touches were put on an impressive edifice whose construction began a decade ago. Russia's state oil giant Rosneft completed its takeover of half of the TNK-BP joint venture from its billionaire Russian owners, having agreed to buy BP's 50 per cent last October.
This definitively signals Vladimir Putin's reconstruction of a state-dominated industry from the building blocks of the privatised oil sector that emerged after the fall of the Soviet Union.
This process was dramatically heralded in October 2003. As his plane waited at the Siberian airport of Novosibirsk, armed commandos arrested Mikhail Khodorkovsky on charges of fraud and tax evasion.
The founder of Yukos, then the largest Russian oil company, he was the best-known of the "oligarchs" who carved up the country's post-Soviet industrial legacy by a mix of insider connections, bribery, legal tricks, smart business and force.
The Kremlin then demolished Yukos with a series of staggering claims for unpaid taxes. Most of its assets ended up with Rosneft, previously a third-rate state entity slated for privatisation itself. Now it is the world's largest publicly traded oil company by production and reserves, with a minority stake listed in London.
From 2000 onwards, Mr Putin tightened his grip on the gas behemoth Gazprom. Roman Abramovich, the owner of Chelsea Football Club, was politely encouraged to sell it his Sibneft oil company; Shell was pressured into handing over a majority stake in the giant Sakhalin-2 project in Russia's Far East. In 2007, Gazprom, which claims 18 per cent of world gas reserves, aspired to be the world's first trillion-dollar company.
The other oligarchs, duly warned, fell into line. The largest remaining non-state oil companies, Lukoil and Surgutneftegaz, are run by Kremlin-friendly managers.
BP-TNK spoilt this structure's architectural perfection. It contained by far the largest western stake in Russian oil. And its independent-minded Russian oligarch owners clashed with the Kremlin's éminence grise Igor Sechin when they challenged BP's Arctic joint venture with Rosneft. BP's odd political misjudgements made its exit almost inevitable.
The monolithic Soviet oil industry, almost entirely broken up during the chaotic 1990s, has thus been largely reassembled: two state titans, two national champions, and a collection of subservient private, regional and international oil companies.
This was not a renationalisation; more a transfer of control and wealth from freewheeling businessmen to well-connected insiders, especially the siloviki - the former state security men around Mr Putin. The political analyst Stanislav Belkovsky alleged in 2007 that the president himself owned 4.5 per cent of Gazprom, 37 per cent of Surgutneftegaz and 50 per cent of the oil trading giant Gunvor.
Cracks are already appearing in the edifice. Russia needs a new generation of oilfields to replace its West Siberian veterans. With question marks over the technical capability of its state giants to explore remote Arctic seas, this means new partnerships with western oil companies, wary after BP of Russia's chilly business climate.
Taxes have to be lowered to encourage new investment. Despite their domestic dominance, the achievements of Gazprom, Rosneft and Lukoil overseas have been modest.
Gazprom's gas production is slipping, as it loses ground in its key European market and customers angle for lower prices. Gazprom may now have to pay higher taxes to make up for shortfalls from the oil sector. Now the company is valued at just over US$100 billion (Dh367.31bn), a far cry from its trillion-dollar ambition.
Intra-elite infighting, stagnation in the oil and gas sector or a fall in oil prices would demand another period of demolition and reconstruction.
Exactly at the point that the edifice is complete, its foundations appear shaky.
 
Robin Mills is the head of consulting at Manaar Energy, and the author of The Myth of the Oil Crisis and Capturing Carbon