"Most mornings I learn more from News Items than I do from all the traditional papers I read combined." - Michael Blair, former presiding partner, Debevoise & Plimpton.
1. Javier Blas:
The Iran war has triggered the largest energy crisis in history, or so the conventional wisdom says. Epochal stuff — but only half-true, because oil is only half the story.
Thanks to the shale revolution and an enviable geological endowment, US and Canadian natural gas consumers are dodging the economic fallout of the Iran conflict. For America, long worried about its reliance on foreign fossil fuels, it’s an embarrassment of riches.
While European and Asian consumers are now paying north of $30 per million British thermal unit for their gas, US buyers pay around $3 per mBtu. Last week, US gas prices briefly touched a two-year low of $2.5 per mBut — in the middle of an energy crisis. Canadian costs are even lower, at about $1.5 per mBtu.
The price difference between gas in Europe and Asia versus North America, reaching now a ratio of 12 times, has never been wider; not during the 2022 gas shock following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, nor in 2011-2012 after the Fukushima nuclear accident, which forced Japan into gas to keep the lights on. (Source: bloomberg.com)
2. The Wall Street Journal:
The U.S. is backing a quick resumption of Russian natural-gas sales to Europe via pipelines running through Moscow’s wartime enemy—Ukraine—as part of negotiations aimed at securing an energy ceasefire ahead of the coming winter, according to U.S., European and Ukrainian officials.
The idea, broached by U.S. envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff during trips to Moscow and Kyiv in September, would involve selling Russian gas via a U.S. intermediary to circumvent European sanctions—and could create a lucrative opportunity for American investors, people who attended the discussions said.
Under current European Union legislation, all purchases of Russian natural gas must be phased out by the end of 2027. Leaders of Europe’s biggest nations have said that they have no interest in restoring their dependence on energy supplies from a country they view as their top strategic threat. (Source: wsj.com)
3. The Wall Street Journal:
For decades, Europeans have been happy to surrender around half of their pay to the state. In exchange, they could expect to retire in their 60s on a relatively comfortable, state-funded pension.
No longer. Stretched public finances and a rapidly aging population are threatening this covenant, stoking fear and anger across the continent oer the future of a cradle-to-grave welfare state voters had long taken for granted.
The outrage is particularly sharp in France, where employees have generally been able to retire at 62 with a tax-funded pension based on their past salary—a promise the cash-strapped, overindebted government is struggling to honor.
Concern about the sustainability of France’s welfare state has been a key driver of the protests that have shaken the country in recent weeks. It is also calling into question the tacit generational contract under which younger workers pay for their elders’ retirement. (Source: wsj.com)
