Age of Dreams

Vol 2 Chapter 2717: Gas dispute

The weather in Europe this year was particularly cold. By December, the average temperature was only 2 degrees, and many places were covered with ice and snow.

After the New Year holiday, the weather became more and more chilly. For Europeans, the cold was even more reluctant to do things, so we ushered in the beginning of the year lazily, and nothing seemed to be exciting.

But at this time, Europeans also ushered in another cold.

After the natural gas price increase at the beginning of 2009, Russia officially announced on January 3 that the price of natural gas supplied to Europe this year would increase by another 18%, reaching US$420 per thousand cubic meters!

As we all know, Europe is an energy-poor place, especially in developed countries such as Western Europe. Basically, the resources that should be available are almost exhausted. So now they are basically rooted in Africa, absorbing all kinds of mineral resources from Africa. For your own use.

However, natural gas, a resource related to national economy and people's livelihood, does not exist in Africa. European countries need to import natural gas resources from the Middle East and Russia.

The natural gas self-sufficiency rate of European countries is about 30%. The remaining 30% is imported from several major oil-producing countries in the Middle East, and 40% is imported from Russia.

In fact, Russia is not the country with the most natural gas reserves in the world. Iran is. They have trillions of cubic meters of storage. Russia has trillions of cubic meters, which is slightly inferior. The United States ranks fifth.

But Iran has always been sanctioned by the Western world, so their oil resources and natural gas are generally not sold to European countries, but to Asia. In the past two years, China’s demand for Iran’s energy imports has greatly increased, but they are allowed to produce. The excess natural gas and oil resources have been fully alleviated.

Although the United States has a vast territory and abundant resources, and its natural gas reserves are absolutely sufficient, the key is that the United States implemented an "energy export ban" in the 1970s, prohibiting the export of energy, especially natural gas. Because this will cause their domestic resource prices to rise-from the previous life to Xiao Qi's reincarnation in 2013, the prices of natural gas, oil, electricity, water and other energy sources in the United States were extremely low compared to China. This is the protection of this "energy export ban"!

Therefore, European countries can only rely on being closest to them. Russia is the most convenient way to transport natural gas. Therefore, the amount of natural gas that Russia has transported to Europe over the years is basically about 130 billion cubic meters per year.

Look at the dependence of European countries on Russian natural gas: Germany imports the most natural gas from Russia each year, at 34.5 billion cubic meters, accounting for 42% of their total consumption; Turkey is close behind. 23.4 billion cubic meters, accounting for 67% of total consumption, Italy 22 billion cubic meters, accounting for 28% of total consumption, Britain 15.2 billion cubic meters, accounting for 16% of total consumption, France 10.1 billion cubic meters, accounting for total consumption 24% of consumption.

Except for these developed countries, other small European countries have a small total of imports, but their dependence on Russia's natural gas is very high-Hungary is 63% and Jack is 80%. Poland is 52%, and Croatia, Slovakia, and Bulgaria import almost 100% of Russian natural gas.

And Russia's natural ally Ukraine, that is, will vacillate between the EU and Russia in the future. Experts predicted at the end of 2013 that the country that will either break out of great changes or break out next year will have a 36% dependence on Russia's natural gas.

It can be said that as soon as Russia says to increase the price of natural gas, the natural gas market in these countries will have a huge shock.

The EU was very dissatisfied with Russia's rogue behavior of increasing prices year after year, and they immediately protested to Russia.

However, if the protests are all useful. Then the army and strength are useless.

In particular, natural gas is a hard currency, an energy that everyone must use, and these are all delivered from Russia, do you like it or not? Anyway, I just want to increase the price, I want to buy more money.

Looking at Russia's resolute attitude, the first response was the three gas companies in Germany. On the one hand, they made representations to Russia, and on the other hand, they were also making emergency announcements. From now on. The price of natural gas rose by 18%, passing all the pressure on users.

Of course the Germans are not happy anymore. Why do you say that the price will increase?

But on the one hand, the Germans do not like to make trouble, and they are more obedient to the strict social system. On the other hand, they also know that Russia is at fault, so large-scale protests did not occur.

But the United Kingdom, France, Spain and Italy, which issued price increases at the same time, are not so happy.

Especially in Spain and Italy, the treasury was already too poor to run rats, public expenditures have been cut to the extreme, and pensions and other payments have been delayed, and the price of energy and energy must be increased again in this extremely cold winter. This led to another outbreak of protests involving hundreds of thousands of people in several countries, with great momentum.

Developed countries like the United Kingdom and France are not doing well. Under the economic downturn these years, their natural gas business was in trouble. Now Russia is raising prices again. They can’t follow the price increase, but they are directly affected. The government's severe criticism has made a lot of trouble.

It was at this time that Li Dachao took a group of entourage and walked into the North and Yorkshire Gas Network Co., Ltd., one of the British gas terminal giants.

The natural gas market in the UK is basically a monopoly mechanism. Natural gas is transported from offshore gas fields and underground transportation pipelines to every corner of the UK by the British Gas Company.

According to the regional division, the United Kingdom is divided into eight gas supplier networks, namely Scotland, North and Yorkshire, Central and Eastern England and Eastern England, Central and Western England, Wales and Southwest, South and Southeast, and East London.

All British natural gas users, whether you are a company user or an individual user, can only purchase natural gas from these eight natural gas suppliers, because natural gas from various channels will only be transported to their warehouses and pipelines, and it is impossible There is a ninth company that can provide natural gas.

But such a monopoly did not bring much luck to the eight major natural gas suppliers. Most of them have been losing money in recent years. The only one who can make money is the natural gas network operator in East London, backed by the essence of Britain. ——London, their natural gas is the most expensive and has the most consumer market.

In addition, everyone is the one who loses more than the other in the game.

The largest loss last year was the North and Yorkshire Gas Network Ltd., with a net loss of 42 million pounds.

However, the natural gas network is a semi-public utility, which is part of the infrastructure, and the profit margin is limited, so they cannot find anyone to take over if they want to get rid of it.

However, the current price increase pressure puts them under even greater pressure. The protests in the subordinate areas are very serious, making their company panic.

When Li Dachao walked into this company, he could obviously feel the panic in their hearts and the joy in their hearts when they saw him come to negotiate.

Qi Shao really has an insight into the details!

Li Dachao couldn't help but sigh in his heart.

It's no wonder that Dad allowed himself to have a good relationship with Qi Shao. Even if Qi Shao and the second child have a better relationship, he still needs his ingenuity and monstrous power and wealth to help him out. That's why such a Changyu Group came out.

Originally, in countries such as Europe, the United Kingdom, and Australia, the Li family had been doing the preparatory work. Xiao Qi's intervention in this way would of course reduce the Li family's profits.

Li Dachao was a little unhappy in his heart. You Xiao Qi is so rich, and you have come to take advantage of us!

But through the first negotiation with the Duke of Saatchi and others, Li Dachao realized Xiao Qi's great influence, which could help him integrate into British investment more easily.

Branson of the Virgin Group also took great care of Li Dachao. He specially sent someone to help him sort out all aspects of the relationship in the UK, so that the Changyu Group's treatment in the UK was quite high, and many detours were avoided.

This is even more true now. If Qi Shao hadn't told himself about the natural gas change, he would probably have bought this company that he had longed for last year.

In that case, the price will not be the cheap price today!

Of course, Li Dachao, who sighed, would not know. If Xiao Qi hadn't said this to him in advance, he would have reached a purchase agreement with the North and Yorkshire Gas Network Co., Ltd. at the end of last year. The purchase price was US$1 billion.

Because the time to enter is very urgent, the price is much more expensive than the 900 million US dollars that Li Dachao bought two years later in Wales and Southwest Natural Gas Network Co., Ltd.~www.wuxiaspot.com~ and now Li Dachao uses up to 800 million US dollars. It can be bought because the debt ratio of the North and Yorkshire Gas Network Co., Ltd. is too high. Maybe 600 million can be won. After all, because of the recession in the past two years, they owed more than 500 million US dollars!

Of course, when Li Dachao acquired Wales and Southwest Natural Gas Network Co., Ltd., in addition to 900 million US dollars in cash, their company owed as much as 1.8 billion US dollars, so it is cheaper now.

Before the reincarnation of Xiao Qi in the previous life, the Li family only bought these two natural gas network companies and controlled 30% of the British residents' gas consumption. They were exclaimed that he controlled the British gas consumption.

In Xiao Qi's view, this is far from enough. It is necessary to add the most elite London East Gas Network Company in the UK, reaching about 50%, and that is really enough to have a foothold in capital.

It is even better to buy a part of the shares of the upstream exploration, production and supply company, British Gas, so that the industrial chain will occupy half, which is a better resource allocation.

To achieve this goal, Li Dachao has to continue to work hard! (To be continued.)