
Falkland Oil and Gas plans to continue drilling into next year, its chief executive said, defying legal threats made by the Argentine government against oil explorers in the Falkland Islands.

Environmental groups and organizations are lobbying to derail Royal Dutch Shell PLC's plan to drill in the Arctic Ocean as soon as July. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, an agency within the U.S. Department of the Interior, gave conditional approval in May to Shell's resumption of fossil fuel exploration in the Arctic, which was paused after a mishap-filled 2012 season.

Crude oil prices were volatile after ministers from the Opec cartel decided to hold production levels at 30 million barrels per day. Brent crude traded in a narrow range around $62 a barrel, before ending the day up 1.8% at $63.15.

In the age of derivatives, swaps, and electronic money transfers, a new form of warfare has emerged: financial warfare. Recently, the US has passed sanctions on countries such as Syria, Venezuela and North Korea, but the majority of energy related sanctions passed have been targeted at Iran and Russia.

Falkland Islands' Her Honour the Acting Governor delivered on Tuesday his State of the Nation speech to the elected Legislative Assembly underlining progress and expansion achieved in the economy and community development, the UK resolute in defending the rights and wishes of the Falkland Islanders to develop their own natural resources, and despite Argentine disruption and blockade efforts, first oil is expected to be produced in 2019.

Brazilian state-controlled oil company Petrobras said that the 13.7bn dollars divestment program it unveiled two months ago does not include plans to sell a stake in its service station network.

The Falkland Islands Government welcomed Thursday's announcement by Premier Oil and partners that the 14/20-1 ‘Isobel Deep’ exploration well has been declared an oil discovery. Isobel Deep in the North Falkland basin, is the second well of a six-well offshore campaign planned to take place in the Islands waters through 2015.

Argentina's oil and gas government managed corporation YPF announced the discovery of a new oil field in Los Caldenes, in Patagonia Rio Negro province, with resources estimated in 40 million oil barrels. Manzano Grande x-1 is the second “discoverer well” in this block of 115 square kilometers located north of the Cinco Saltos town.

Premier Oil’s high-impact Falklands Isobel Deep well has hit oil shows in a suspected high pressure formation, partners Rockhopper Exploration and Falkland Oil & Gas Ltd., said Tuesday morning. But, the area will now have to be cased, delaying the drilling program.

Borders & Southern has issued a technical update on its Darwin gas/condensate discovery south of the Falkland Islands and near-field prospectivity. The goal was to improve understanding of the Darwin reservoir interval, both within and surrounding the discovery and also its projected facies trend along the Aptian shelf