Norway

Seadrill Ltd. jumped as much as 26 percent as the offshore driller controlled by John Fredriksen said it’s getting closer to a solution to restructure the industry’s heaviest debt load and that it’s promoting a company insider to chief executive officer, Bloomberg News reported. Seadrill has been working for well over a year to restructure a wall of debt incurred before crude prices started collapsing in 2014, abruptly closing a decade-long boom for the oil-service industry.

The pace of consolidation in the crisis-hit shipping industry accelerated on Monday after three of Norway's biggest offshore oil industry service vessel (OSV) operators announced plans to merge to create one of the biggest fleets in the sector, Reuters reported. Shipping tycoon John Fredriksen and Norwegian billionaire Kjell Inge Roekke said they had agreed a restructuring plan for Farstad Shipping, via a debt-for-equity swap and additional share issue, solving long-running efforts to address liabilities worth 12.6 billion crowns ($1.53 billion) at end-September.

Norway’s central bank is predicted to leave its key policy rate unchanged at a record low as the economy of western Europe’s biggest oil producer fights off the biggest slump in crude prices in a generation, Bloomberg News reported. The central bank will keep its key policy rate at 0.50 percent at a meeting on Thursday, according to 15 of 22 economist surveyed by Bloomberg. Seven predict a cut to 0.25 percent. The bank will likely keep an easing bias to avoid the krone from strengthening too much, according to DNB ASA and Nordea Bank.

Restructuring the debt of struggling offshore oil service vessel (OSV) and drilling rig companies will take years to complete and complex cases must go through multiple stages, an executive at top Norwegian bank DNB told Reuters on Tuesday. Dozens of exploration rigs and more than 100 service vessels have been mothballed since the plunge in oil prices began in mid-2014, leaving owners unable to repay billions of dollars to banks and bondholders.

Oil and gas companies operating in Norway, western Europe’s biggest producer, cut investment forecasts further for this year and next as they continue to weather a two-year long collapse in crude prices, Bloomberg News reported. Investments in Norway’s offshore oil and gas industry are now expected to fall to 163 billion kroner ($20 billion) in 2016, down from a 166 billion-krone estimate in May, according to a quarterly survey published by Statistic Norway on Wednesday. The estimate for 2017 fell to 151 billion kroner from 153 billion kroner.

Oil and gas companies operating in Norway, western Europe’s biggest producer, cut investment forecasts further for this year and next as they continue to weather a two-year long collapse in crude prices, Bloomberg News reported. Investments in Norway’s offshore oil and gas industry are now expected to fall to 163 billion kroner ($20 billion) in 2016, down from a 166 billion-krone estimate in May, according to a quarterly survey published by Statistic Norway on Wednesday. The estimate for 2017 fell to 151 billion kroner from 153 billion kroner.

Britain’s vote to leave the European Union could hurt Norway’s exports to Britain and hit the profitability of the Nordic country’s banking, insurance and property sectors, the International Monetary Fund said, Reuters reported. Britain is Norway’s third-biggest destination for goods produced by its mainland economy, which excludes the volatile oil and shipping sector, with an eight-per cent share. Mainland exports are primarily seafood, including salmon, but Norway is also a major gas supplier to Britain and its $860-billion wealth fund, the world’s largest, is a major foreign investor.

The world’s biggest sovereign wealth fund is launching a crackdown on executive pay, targeting high salaries at companies around the globe in an attempt to exert its influence in a debate that has been gathering pace in recent months. Norway’s $870bn oil fund, which has previously refused to interfere in how much chief executives are paid, has decided that its position is untenable and is looking for a first company to target publicly on pay in the coming months, the Financial Times reported.

Norway’s central bank is cutting interest rates to a record low and refusing to rule out going below zero as the collapse in oil prices takes its toll, the Financial Times reported. Norges Bank reduced its key policy rate by 25 basis points to 0.5 per cent despite admitting the move could increase “financial system vulnerabilities” with many worried about the prospect of a housing bubble. “The current outlook for the Norwegian economy suggests that the key policy rate may be reduced further in the course of the year,” said Oystein Olsen, governor of the central bank.

For three hours on a recent Thursday, Norway’s state-owned oil-and-gas company Statoil ASA transformed these offshore rigs into a marketing platform for a special guest: the European Union’s energy czar, Maros Sefcovic, The Wall Street Journal reported. Natural-gas fields like Sleipner have helped cook meals and heat homes in Europe for several decades, but their output will gradually fade away. To replace those aging North Sea fields, Norway is considering plowing billions of dollars into similar installations 1,000 miles to the north, in the Barents Sea.