Argentina’s proposal to nationalize the country’s biggest oil company sailed through the Argentine Senate by a 63-3 vote yesterday, underscoring broad domestic support for a move that has infuriated foreign investors.
The bill aimed at expropriating YPF, a unit of Spanish energy major Repsol, is expected to be approved by the lower house next week and become law.
Argentine President Cristina Fernandez, a popular second-term leader who controls both houses of the Argentine Congress, unveiled plans last week to seize a 51 percent stake in YPF from Repsol.
She says the parent company has under-invested and under-produced in Argentina, a charge that Repsol dismisses.
Most Argentines support the move to renationalize YPF, privatized in the 1990s after 70 years under full state control. Many blame the privatizations and free-market reforms of that decade for provoking Argentina’s 2001-2002 financial meltdown.
“The privatization of YPF was one of the worst mistakes of that era,” Senator Miguel Pichetto, a Fernandez ally, said just before the vote was called.
Latin America’s No. 3 economy has yet to return to global credit markets a decade after its crippling 2001-2002 sovereign debt default — the biggest in history.
With memories of this debacle still fresh, many voters have hailed Fernandez’s calls for “energy sovereignty.”
“The government’s bill doesn’t reflect a capricious or random decision,” ruling party senator Marcelo Fuentes said during the marathon debate. “It’s a logical result stemming from the need to reverse free-market thinking in energy policy.”
The early morning vote, in which four senators abstained, was held after a 15-hour debate.
Argentina’s trade surplus, a pillar of Fernandez’s economic policy, shrank last year as fuel imports more than doubled — sending the issue of flagging oil and natural-gas production to the top of the president’s list of priorities.
Once the takeover becomes law, attention will turn to the compensation Argentina will pay Repsol for its stake. Officials have already said it will be far lower than the US$9.3 billion the company has sought.
Moody’s warned that other Argentine energy companies such as Pan American Energy, majority owned by BP PLC, and Petrobras Argentina now face a higher risk of government interference in the oil-and-gas sector.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last