Semapa paga 148 milhões pela Imedexa na primeira compra fora do país

[Alfred E. Neuman]

Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Venezuela extended a recall referendum on President Hugo Chavez into a second day, after a record turnout and malfunctioning ballot machines kept voters in line for as long as 10 hours.

[Alfred E. Neuman]

Mon Aug 16, 2004 12:45 AM ET

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - NYMEX crude oil futures soared to a record of $46.90 a barrel on Monday on concerns about possible unrest and disruption to oil supply as Venezuelans voted in large numbers on whether to recall President Hugo Chavez.
The market was also worried over Iraq's oil exports, which were running at half their normal rates on Sunday as a Shi'ite uprising prevented the re-opening of a main export pipeline and shut the South Oil Company's headquarters, officials said.

Light crude oil for September delivery rose 32 cents to $46.90 a barrel -- the highest since the New York Mercantile Exchange launched oil futures 21 years ago -- in ACCESS electronic trading.

Volume was a thin 1,720 contracts, excluding spread deals, at 0409 GMT, when prices stood at $46.83. ACCESS trading started at 2300 GMT ahead of the opening of New York Mercantile Exchange floor trading.

Tokyo crude oil futures also hit record highs on Monday, tracking strong U.S. crude oil prices.

Energy markets have been worried about disruptions to oil exports from Venezuela, the world's fifth-largest crude exporter, if the referendum triggers social unrest and opposition strikes.

"There are lots of concerns in the oil market now, like the Iraqi situation and OPEC's thin spare capacity, but for today the market is focusing on the Venezuela vote," said Tony Nunan, a manager at Mitsubishi Corp's international petroleum business.

"As most major resistances have been broken, oil is likely to continue to break more resistances ahead, testing $50."

A chart analyst put the next resistance line $47.46. Support would be at $44.25 a barrel, he said.

Polling in Venezuela was extended until midnight (0400 GMT) as large numbers of people turned out to vote in a referendum on whether to recall Chavez or back his mandate to govern the country for the next two years.

If Chavez loses -- early official results were likely on Monday -- a presidential election must be held within 30 days.

But shipping sources said exports had not been disturbed so far. "Everything is running smoothly," said one source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, adding there were no signs that exports would be shut down even if Chavez lost.

In London, Brent crude for September delivery settled at $43.88 a barrel on Friday and was bid at $43.73. The October contract was up $29 cents at $43.20 a barrel.

Exports from Iraq have been reduced to around 900,000 barrels per day (bpd) for nearly a week, since the southern pipeline was attacked by saboteurs and while a U.S. offensive against followers of radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr extended to several Iraqi cities.

The market is also watching the impact of ongoing storms in the U.S. Gulf Coast on crude production.

Tropical Storm Earl swirled through the Caribbean on Sunday on a track forecasters said was likely to keep it south of Hurricane Charley's deadly path toward Florida and take it to Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula.

NYMEX September gasoline stood at $1.3465 a gallon, down 0.3 cents. A gasoline-producing unit at Shell Oil Co.'s 340,000-bpd joint-venture refinery in Deer Park, Texas, was restarted on Sunday after a weekend of maintenance work, a refinery spokesman said.

NYMEX September heating oil was at $1.2195 a gallon, 0.5 cents higher.

Scorching global crude values and low kerosene stocks drove up most oil futures contracts on the Tokyo Commodity Exchange (TOCOM), with benchmark January up 810 yen at 26,700 yen per kiloliter (yen/kl), a fresh high.

"All oil futures, except the prompt month gasoline contract, rose to record highs," the TOCOM spokesman said.

TOCOM February gasoline was trading 1,010 yen higher at 37,710 yen/kl, while February TOCOM kerosene was trading 970 yen up at 41,190 yen/kl.

TOCOM February gas oil gained 700 yen to 36,660 yen/kl

[Alfred E. Neuman]

Sun Aug 15, 2004 02:06 PM ET
By Manuela Badawy

NEW YORK, Aug 15 (Reuters) - Regardless of the outcome of Venezuela's recall referendum, the country's bonds are expected to remain in demand as investors look for attractive high-yielding emerging debt.

Venezuelans vote on Sunday to decide whether President Hugo Chavez should stay in power at the world's fifth-largest oil exporter.

"The market is putting back money on the carry trade to some degree by the idiosyncratic risk in Venezuela, and a couple of other places," said Mark Dow, portfolio manager at MFS Investment in Boston.

Carry trade involves borrowing short-term money at low interest rates and investing in higher-yielding long-dated securities such as emerging market debt.

With crude oil prices at all-time highs, holders of Venezuela's sovereign government bonds are hoping Chavez will win as they see a victory guaranteeing the continued flow of rising oil revenue that allows the country to pay its foreign debt.

Venezuela's bonds rallied ahead of the vote on the assumption that little will change if Chavez wins.

Finance Minister Tobias Nobrega said on Friday Venezuela will keep its current economic program in place no matter what happens with the referendum, while investors say the results will make little difference with oil prices touching record highs.

"With oil at around $46 a barrel it is tough to bet against Venezuela," said Jim Barrineau, vice president of emerging market research at Alliance Capital Management in New York.

On Friday, Venezuela's benchmark global bond due 2027 (VENGLB27=RR: Quote, Profile, Research) rose 0.750 basis points, to yield 10.145 percent. Its spread stood at 513 basis points over the yield on the U.S. 30-year Treasury bond.

Venezuela spreads tightened by four basis points to 562 on the EMBI+, while its total returns rose 0.51 percent on the back of soaring crude oil futures.

Meanwhile, Brazil's central bank on Wednesday is expected to hold its key lending rate steady for August to keep inflationary pressures in check.

Brazil's highest court is expected to rule next week on the constitutionality of the government's pension reform. An adverse decision could deal a blow to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva's plan to cut public spending.

Brazil's global bond due 2040 (BRAGLB40=RR: Quote, Profile, Research) , considered the emerging market benchmark paper, rose 1.313 basis points. Its yield stood at 10.931 percent, or 643 basis points over the yield on the U.S. 10-year Treasury note.

Brazil sovereign spreads narrowed by 16 basis points on the EMBI+.

Investors will closely watch the Dominican Republic's new president-elect, Leonel Fernandez, as he takes office on Monday with $1.1 billion in global bonds to worry about.

Investors will also pay attention to Argentina's July industrial production data due on Thursday for signs of economic slowdown. In addition, Mexico will release its June retail sales data on Thursday.

[Alfred E. Neuman]

Aug. 15 (Bloomberg)

Venezuela extended polling hours for a referendum on whether to recall President Hugo Chavez after voters waited in line more than six hours to cast their ballots.

Polls will close at 8 p.m. (8 p.m. New York time), four hours later than originally planned, because of a high turnout, National Electoral Council Vice President Jorge Rodriguez said in a televised press conference in Caracas. New fingerprint scanners, put in place to guard against fraud, also contributed to delays.

``I put my fingerprint in a machine and it didn't work, so I had to go to another machine,'' Chavez, 50, said after casting his ballot in western Caracas at midday. ``This slight delay adds with another and another and they accumulate and the lines are long.''

The delays may cause both Chavez's supporters and opponents to grow frustrated with the election process, increasing the chances of violence, Julia Buxton, a political science professor at Kingston University in Surrey, England, said in an interview. Concern the vote may prompt violence in the world's fifth-largest oil supplier helped push crude prices to record highs Friday.

``The problem is that all these delays are going to do is to increase tensions on both sides,'' Buxton said.

Carter

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, who is among international observers monitoring the vote, said that the voting was ``going quite well.'' Lines snaked for more than five city blocks in Caracas as voters headed to the polls before they opened at 6 a.m.

The state oil company doubled security at its fields, refineries and storage tanks ahead of the vote, and the Venezuelan army stationed soldiers at the nation's almost 9,000 polling stations.

Energy Minister Rafael Ramirez said on Friday that crude prices would surge should unrest threaten oil production. Previous attempts to oust Chavez, including a military coup and a national strike, sparked deadly protests.

``The big question at the end of the day is whether people will accept the results,'' Buxton said.

The opposition, led by Enrique Mendoza, the governor of Miranda state, and Julio Borges, national coordinator for the First Justice Party, forced the referendum on Chavez after gathering 2.44 million signatures. Mendoza said at a press conference Friday that Chavez failed to combat crime and create jobs since taking office in 1999.

`Jobs, Investments'

``We need jobs, we need investments,'' Marco Falcon, a 65-year- old university professor, said after voting in favor of a recall in El Rosal, a middle-class neighborhood of the capital.

Posters plastered on lampposts and buildings across Caracas read: ``Yes for Venezuela'' and ``Vote No.'' A ``yes'' vote supports a recall and a ``no'' vote is against it.

For Chavez to be recalled, the opposition must win a majority of votes and more than the 3.76 million that he won in 2000 when he stood for re-election because of changes in the constitution. About one third of polling stations use the scanners to verify the identity of voters.

Results will be released less than three hours after voting ends, according to the National Electoral Council.

Chavez, a former paratrooper who counts Cuban President Fidel Castro among his friends, doubled spending between January and May on education, health and other social programs. His standing improved in opinion polls last month by Consultores 21 and Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research Inc. A Consultores poll published in July showed 54 percent of registered voters wanted to recall Chavez compared with 66 percent in March.

Some polls surveying Venezuela's 14 million voters, including one published July 27 by Evans/McDonough Co. and Caracas-based Varianzas Opinion and commissioned by the state oil company, showed Chavez winning the vote.

`Chavez Cares'

``Chavez cares about poor people, and the country is advancing,'' said Maria Eugenia Gonzalez, 65, a retired hairdresser, who waited in line for three hours to vote in La Candelaria. ``I have no doubt he is going to win.''

Analysts at J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and HSBC Holdings Plc. said in reports published last week the ballot was too close to call.

A 43 percent rise in world oil prices this year helped South America's third-largest economy rebound from last year's contraction.

Crude oil for September delivery rose $1.08, or 2.4 percent, to close at $46.58 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange Friday, the highest since oil began trading in New York in 1983.

Economy Grows

Venezuela's $85 billion gross domestic product expanded 30 percent in the first quarter after shrinking 9 percent in both 2002 and 2003. A two-month strike that ended in early February 2003 caused factories to shut down across the country and Venezuelan petroleum output to drop as much as 95 percent.

Chavez, who led a failed coup attempt in 1992, responded to the strike by sacking 18,000 of state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela's 33,000 employees and restricting access to dollars.

Venezuela's benchmark bond due 2027 rose 0.1 cent on the dollar to a six-month high of 91.4 cents on Friday on expectations Chavez will win the vote and keep up interest payments on the nation's $22 billion foreign debt.

``Chavez is the devil we know and will keep things as they are now,'' said Nicholas Field, who manages $750 million of emerging market-debt, including Venezuelan bonds, at WestLB Asset Management in London.

The U.S. State Department said in a statement on Wednesday that the ballot may lead to violence. Ten people were killed when shooting broke out during anti-Chavez demonstrations in March.

Chavez, who was ousted for two days in a military coup in April 2002, could only lose the recall vote by fraud, Ramirez, the energy minister, said at a press conference on Friday.

Unemployment climbed to as high as 20.7 percent in March 2003 compared with 11 percent in 1998, and was at about 16 percent in March this year, government figures show. Caracas had the third- highest murder rate of any city in the Americas between 1999 and 2003, according to the Inter-American Development Bank.

``This could be the opposition's last chance to get Chavez out of office,'' Miguel Diaz, who directs the South American project at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, said in an interview. ``The opposition believes that this could be the last stand for democracy in the country.''



To contact the reporter on this story:
Peter Wilson in Caracas pewilson@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor of this story:
Laura Zelenko at lzelenko@bloomberg.net
Last Updated: August 15, 2004 17:18 EDT

[Alfred E. Neuman]

CARACAS, Venezuela Aug. 15, 2004 — Venezuela's oil industry will enter a new period of stability and growth after Sunday's referendum on Hugo Chavez's presidency, the president of the state-run oil company said Sunday.
Edginess over possible disruptions in Venezuela's oil industry, which normally provides almost 15 percent of U.S. imports, contributed last week to record-high oil prices, which reached more than $46 a barrel.

"For the oil industry, this event will contribute to stabilization," said Ali Rodriguez, the president of Petroleos de Venezuela S.A., or PDVSA. "At last our oil workers can work without the constant pressure of these (political) campaigns."

Rodriguez, a close ally of Chavez, suggested the president would defeat the opposition and remain in office.

Under Chavez, Venezuela has become a price hawk within the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, which produces roughly 30 percent of the world's oil supply.

PDVSA has benefited from high oil prices and will boost production to 5 million barrels a day by 2005, Rodriguez said. The government claims PDVSA currently is pumping more than 3 million barrels per day, but analysts say output is closer to 2.6 million barrels.

Production will nearly double with help from foreign oil companies, said Rodriguez, a close ally of Chavez.

"PDVSA is in the best conditions to meet investment plans," said Rodriguez, adding that the mammoth company intends to invest $37 billion over the next five years.

Foreign oil companies also are ready to proceed with investments, Rodriguez said.

Chevron Texaco Corp. plans to invest $6 billion in a heavy crude refining project and Exxon Mobil Corp. intends to build a $3 billion petrochemical plant. Both companies announced the investment plans this month.

Chavez, a left-wing firebrand, was elected in 1998 and re-elected in 2000. Venezuelans can vote "no" to keep Chavez in office or "yes" to recall him.

For Chavez to lose, more citizens must vote to recall him than the nearly 3.8 million who re-elected him in 2000.

Venezuela would be in political limbo for a month if Chavez were to lose Sunday. Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel would take power until new elections are held, and Chavez already has said he would seek re-election.