CCIEE Holds “Overseas Investment in Energy” Seminar

CCIEE Holds “Overseas Investment in Energy” Seminar

On March 16, 2015, CCIEE held the “Overseas Investment in Energy” Seminar. Delegates discussed cooperation in energy investment in North America and provided Chinese companies with recommendations on how to better enter North America’s oil and gas market. Zhang Xiaoqiang, Permanent Vice Chairman of CCIEE, John Walker, CEO of Ener Vest and delegates from National Development and Reform Commission, National Bureau of Energy, State Development Bank, Sinopec Corporation and Guojingxinyuan Capital Management Co., Ltd participated in the seminar.

Zhang Xiaoqiang pointed out that the U.S. has a relatively sound market, better infrastructure and human resource and thus is very appealing to Chinese companies. Furthermore, the energy investment funds in the U.S. are very active and their investors are highly diversified, all these are worth China learning. As a big country, China is actively optimizing its energy structure and increasing its consumption of clean energy. Therefore, China has a huge demand for natural gas and the two nations should strengthen cooperation in this field. China heavily replies on foreign oil and more than 60% of its oil is imported. Nonetheless, China companies’ investments in energy of the U.S. and other regions are relatively small, which makes their investments in foreign energy industry, especially oil and gas are very important.

Mr. Walker thanked CCIEE for organizing the seminar and introduced the oil and gas industry in the U.S., the history and development of Ener Vest as well as the opportunities for Chinese companies to invest in the U.S. He believes that the price of crude oil is likely to stop declining in the second half of 2015 and will continue to rise until 2016. Based on more than 40 years’ experience of Ener Vest, Mr. Walker considers the recovery period right after oil price slide as the best time to buy oil and gas assets.

Delegates analyzed current global investments in energy and new ways of international cooperation and investment in energy. Apart from that, they expressed their views on how to guide and support Chinese companies to better implement the strategy of go abroad and promote further cooperation in energy industry between China and the U.S.