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BP Considering Suspension of Dividends

apdst said:
Yeah! **** me in the ass for wanting to pay my bills! I should just go belly up and get on unemployment. Oh, wait, I'm self employed, I don't qualify for unemployment.
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Then you should have just told the truth and said "I want BP to go on corporate welfare, because I want to be a taxpayer-supported welfare queen," instead of concocting a dishonest argument about how we need to support BP so they can pay us back, which is completely absurd. The fact that you didn't reveal your personal connection to BP up front makes it impossible to take anything else you have to say seriously. You were intentionally deceitful in your argument.

apdst said:
BTW, how do you know it was BP's incompetance that caused this blowout?
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BP has essentially admitted as much. Besides, they have been responsible for far more safety violations than all other oil companies combined in the United States.

apdst said:
And, why aren't you citing Halliburton as being the culprit anymore? Do you know what happened to cause this blowout? Hmmm?
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I never cited Halliburton as the culprit; you just have a reading comprehension problem. I said BP and/or Halliburton, which is true. Halliburton may or may not bear some responsibility too, but BP is certainly going to foot the lion's share of the bill. But anyway, I'm not going to get sucked into this discussion with you again. You've shown yourself to be a bald-faced liar in this thread, and as such, I'm not going to take anything else you have to say seriously.
 
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Kandahar said:
I never cited Halliburton as the culprit; you just have a reading comprehension problem. I said BP and/or Halliburton, which is true. Halliburton may or may not bear some responsibility too, but BP is certainly going to foot the lion's share of the bill. But anyway, I'm not going to get sucked into this discussion with you again. You've shown yourself to be a bald-faced liar in this thread, and as such, I'm not going to take anything else you have to say seriously.
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Just want to throw out that that Halliburton will have no liability in this scenario. BP is responsible for the actions of their contractors working on the rig, so the liability would be with BP, even if a Halliburton contractor caused this.

That is why you are seeing BP attempt to shift the focus to the manufacturer of the equipment, since they could be held liable. That is a losing argument for BP at this point however, and it seems clear that the manufacturer's potential liability would be capped at only the amount of oil on the platform when it sank, which is only a few million.
 
Kandahar said:
Then you should have just told the truth and said "I want BP to go on corporate welfare, because I want to be a taxpayer-supported welfare queen," instead of concocting a dishonest argument about how we need to support BP so they can pay us back, which is completely absurd. The fact that you didn't reveal your personal connection to BP up front makes it impossible to take anything else you have to say seriously. You were intentionally deceitful in your argument.
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I'm not saying that BP should be on corporate welfare. Although, BP is just as too big to fail as any other outfit bailed out by the US government.

As far as my, "personal connection", to BP, there is none. I do, however, have a personal connection to offshore drilling. What do you do for a living?



BP has essentially admitted as much. Besides, they have been responsible for far more safety violations than all other oil companies combined in the United States.
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BP has more rigs than any other oil company in the world, so of course they're going to have more safety violations. Do you have a clue what rates as a, "violation"?



I never cited Halliburton as the culprit; you just have a reading comprehension problem. I said BP and/or Halliburton, which is true. Halliburton may or may not bear some responsibility too, but BP is certainly going to foot the lion's share of the bill. But anyway, I'm not going to get sucked into this discussion with you again. You've shown yourself to be a bald-faced liar in this thread, and as such, I'm not going to take anything else you have to say seriously.
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You cited, "BP/Halliburton", in another thread. There was never an, "and/or". Either way, you had your mind made up that Halliburton was at fault. Brainwashed much? Why haven't you blamed Cooper-Cameron for the BOP failing? Not enough political capital in it for ya's?
 
Harry Guerrilla said:
They have plenty of money to do both.
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This comment has no basis in reality. You simply cannot make such a claim without knowing what the potential liabiity for the oil spill will be in terms of dollars.
 
They maintain cash balances of about $9B and have a annual cash flow of approximately $27B. They have taken an incredible goodwill hit, which should adversely impact annual cash flow. This clean-up and related damages could be north of $50B. They don't have "plenty of money to do both".
 
NolaMan said:
This comment has no basis in reality. You simply cannot make such a claim without knowing what the potential liabiity for the oil spill will be in terms of dollars.
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Probably a couple of billion, I could be wrong but I think that should cover it.
On the other hand, how do you know they can't?
 
Kandahar said:
As of today, BP's market cap is still $106 billion (and that's WITH the expected costs already factored in to the stock price). That's plenty to cover the expenses arising from the cleanup, and whatever incidental expenses they're legally required to pay. All of this talk about "poor BP, we need to help them profit so they can pay us back" is pure bull****. There is no question about their ability to pay whatever amount they might conceivably be required to pay. Do you people own stock in BP or something? :roll:
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Of course there is a question about their ability to pay..... BP is no more the bottomless pit of wealth than Gulf of Mexico is not a vast sea that can absorb anything dumped in it. They have an annual cash flow of $25-30B and $8B in the bank. The big unknown is the financial magnitude of this disaster and to what extent they can tap their partners in crime (Anadarko, Halliburton and TransOcean) to payout on this.

The market cap is a nice number, but it doesn't pay the bills.
 
Harry Guerrilla said:
Probably a couple of billion, I could be wrong but I think that should cover it.
On the other hand, how do you know they can't?
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i have never said they could not handle it, however simply saying "there is plenty of money to go around" shows a complete lack of thought about the scenario we are facing. It is widely accepted at this point that BP will be found grossly negligent, and even criminally negligent, in which case there is no cap on their liability. A "couple billion" will probably cover the actual clean up cost, but that ignores the liability they will face for lost wages of thousands in the Gulf, as well as lawsuits to recover losses from their partners operating the rig, as well as government claims to lost tax revenues... the potential liability could easily go into the tens of billions.

With roughly 9 billion cash on hand, a tarnished credit rating, and loss of revenues from other sources impacted by the moratorium, there is no assurance that they will simply write a big check and go along their merry way. It is far to premature to assume they will have no problem covering the liability.
 
upsideguy said:
Of course there is a question about their ability to pay..... BP is no more the bottomless pit of wealth than Gulf of Mexico is not a vast sea that can absorb anything dumped in it. They have an annual cash flow of $25-30B and $8B in the bank. The big unknown is the financial magnitude of this disaster and to what extent they can tap their partners in crime (Anadarko, Halliburton and TransOcean) to payout on this.

The market cap is a nice number, but it doesn't pay the bills.
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I posted earlier, Anadarko will most likely have no liability, and can probably get back most of their money by suing BP after BP is found grossly negligent. Halliburton will definitely have no liability, and TransOcean I have not looked into. This will be BP's to cover.
 
NolaMan said:
i have never said they could not handle it, however simply saying "there is plenty of money to go around" shows a complete lack of thought about the scenario we are facing. It is widely accepted at this point that BP will be found grossly negligent, and even criminally negligent, in which case there is no cap on their liability. A "couple billion" will probably cover the actual clean up cost, but that ignores the liability they will face for lost wages of thousands in the Gulf, as well as lawsuits to recover losses from their partners operating the rig, as well as government claims to lost tax revenues... the potential liability could easily go into the tens of billions.

With roughly 9 billion cash on hand, a tarnished credit rating, and loss of revenues from other sources impacted by the moratorium, there is no assurance that they will simply write a big check and go along their merry way. It is far to premature to assume they will have no problem covering the liability.
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If you think they should be found criminally negligent, then they will most likely try to avoid paying anything.
If I were them, I would do the same thing.

As it is now, the cost of the clean up so far has been approximately 1.25 billion.
They are already handling claims on top of that, they shouldn't be required to handle claims made by workers the government suspended.

That wasn't their fault.
 
Harry Guerrilla said:
If you think they should be found criminally negligent, then they will most likely try to avoid paying anything.
If I were them, I would do the same thing.
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Try all you might, you cannot avoid paying out at least large sums of money in this scenario. I think they will most likely be found criminally negligent, but at the very minimum they will be found grossly negligent, which eliminates the liability cap as well.

They could file for bankruptcy I suppose, but in Chapter 11 they would still have to pay out, just restructured. And Chapter 7 they would be liquidated. Neither of those is a good option.

As it is now, the cost of the clean up so far has been approximately 1.25 billion.
They are already handling claims on top of that, they shouldn't be required to handle claims made by workers the government suspended.

That wasn't their fault.
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I agree they should not have to pay workers that the government suspended, but the government apparently seems to think otherwise. Aside from that however, they can (and will) be held liable for lost wages of seafood industires in the Gulf etc that have been basically shut down due to this spill, and that is not going to be cheap.

But think about even just the clean up, you say it has already cost 1.25 billion, and they have really cleaned up nothing to date.
 
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NolaMan said:
Try all you might, you cannot avoid paying out at least large sums of money in this scenario. I think they will most likely be found criminally negligent, but at the very minimum they will be found grossly negligent, which eliminates the liability cap as well.

They could file for bankruptcy I suppose, but in Chapter 11 they would still have to pay out, just restructured. And Chapter 7 they would be liquidated. Neither of those is a good option.

I agree they should not have to pay workers that the government suspended, but the government apparently seems to think otherwise. Aside from that however, they can (and will) be held liable for lost wages of seafood industires in the Gulf etc that have been basically shut down due to this spill, and that is not going to be cheap.

But think about even just the clean up, you say it has already cost 1.25 billion, and they have really cleaned up nothing to date.
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For the most part, I want people to stop crying foul and playing the blame game until we can actually get the well under control.
Until then, it is all the same "big oil" haters take pot shots at their favorite enemy.

The reaction of the government is very similar to the Toyota floor peddle stick problems, lots of loud mouth, blow hards flying off the handle.
 
Harry Guerrilla said:
For the most part, I want people to stop crying foul and playing the blame game until we can actually get the well under control.
Until then, it is all the same "big oil" haters take pot shots at their favorite enemy.

The reaction of the government is very similar to the Toyota floor peddle stick problems, lots of loud mouth, blow hards flying off the handle.
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If your "big oil hater" comment is directed at me, that is hilarious. I am a huge proponent of drilling and supporting oil companies.

That said, the government reaction is what it is, but what it does not change is that until the well gets capped, BP's potential liability only increases with every barrell that escapes. That is just a fact.
 
Just throwing some ideas out there, but could scuttling an old decommisioned Navy vessel over the oil leak possibly plug it?

Wild idea, I know, but the focus has pretty much shifted to drilling a relief well and nothing more, which could take months.
 
Deputy Fife said:
Just throwing some ideas out there, but could scuttling an old decommisioned Navy vessel over the oil leak possibly plug it?

Wild idea, I know, but the focus has pretty much shifted to drilling a relief well and nothing more, which could take months.
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No idea on the ship, I am not an engineer. Assuming you could get it to sit where you need it and the pressure of the oil didn't just blow through it, I suppose it would be worth a shot.

Relief wells are really the only good way to get it stopped according to people in the industry. Everything outside of that just seems to be desperate attempts to get lucky since relief wells will take at least probably until August to really get out there.
 
NolaMan said:
If your "big oil hater" comment is directed at me, that is hilarious. I am a huge proponent of drilling and supporting oil companies.
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Not directed towards you but at the people who yearn for the chance to talk **** about oil companies, any time they fart the wrong way.

NolaMan said:
That said, the government reaction is what it is, but what it does not change is that until the well gets capped, BP's potential liability only increases with every barrell that escapes. That is just a fact.
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Understandable.
They are trying to fix it though.
 
Kandahar said:
As of today, BP's market cap is still $106 billion (and that's WITH the expected costs already factored in to the stock price). That's plenty to cover the expenses arising from the cleanup, and whatever incidental expenses they're legally required to pay. All of this talk about "poor BP, we need to help them profit so they can pay us back" is pure bull****. There is no question about their ability to pay whatever amount they might conceivably be required to pay. Do you people own stock in BP or something? :roll:
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Not yet, but right now, I am tempted. Just waiting for it to go a little lower. LOL.
 
danarhea said:
Not yet, but right now, I am tempted. Just waiting for it to go a little lower. LOL.
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I've been watching it, if it gets around $21-$22 a share, I might pick some up.
 
I will tell ya this: our gov better not even go nowhere near bailing out BP. They do that? I may move! Honestly some people I talk to seem to think that BP will beg the gov to bail them out just like the banks and that our gov will help them. That best not happen.
 
danarhea said:
Suspension of dividends? I am still waiting for them to admit that they suspended their ethics, not to mention their brains.
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A lot of people will be screwed if they do not pay dividends. I'm talking about pensioners. The State of CT alone owns something like 4.1 million shares of BP
 
Kandahar said:
As of today, BP's market cap is still $106 billion (and that's WITH the expected costs already factored in to the stock price). That's plenty to cover the expenses arising from the cleanup, and whatever incidental expenses they're legally required to pay. All of this talk about "poor BP, we need to help them profit so they can pay us back" is pure bull****. There is no question about their ability to pay whatever amount they might conceivably be required to pay. Do you people own stock in BP or something? :roll:
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YEAH! I am damn sure not gonna cry me a river for BP! They will never get another dime from me if I can help it and they are far from hurting. They have the money to pay for all of this and then some. They are not gonna fool me into tricks!
 
Kali said:
YEAH! I am damn sure not gonna cry me a river for BP! They will never get another dime from me if I can help it and they are far from hurting. They have the money to pay for all of this and then some. They are not gonna fool me into tricks!
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It's almost impossible for anyone to not give BP another dime.
You can't sift through oil and decide which was pumped by BP and which wasn't.
 
danarhea said:
Not yet, but right now, I am tempted. Just waiting for it to go a little lower. LOL.
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Funny story <not>. Tried that same strategy when WorldCom was in their death spiral. Boy, did that turn out to be an expensive education..... :doh


.
 
Deputy Fife said:
Just throwing some ideas out there, but could scuttling an old decommisioned Navy vessel over the oil leak possibly plug it?

Wild idea, I know, but the focus has pretty much shifted to drilling a relief well and nothing more, which could take months.
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No, this would not plug the leak. You need to seal it tight, random debris from a sinking ship isn't going to do that. (plus, it's 5000 feet down, well below crush-depth for an aged destroyer. the ship would be breaking apart as it went down)
 
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