• China lends Nigeria Dollars 2bn in exchange for oil talks. • Ft com site : China oils Nigeria talks with loan

cellphone) Tel: [phone] [e-mail] Manager Investor Relations & Corporate Legal Counsel
Press Jacqueline van den Bergen + 31622448435 (cellphone) Tel: [phone] [e-mail] Manager Internal and External Communications ______________________________________ _______________________________________________
____________________________________________________________ (c)2008 Market News Publishing Inc. All rights reserved. Toronto:[phone] Vancouver:[phone] Fax:[phone]
80580430FAC80581970-10365720080228
Document MNEWSP0020080228e42s004xv
Announcement: Annual Report 2007 Dockwise Ltd. online available
567 words

28 February 2008

Market Wire

ITWR

English

(c) Copyright 2008 Market Wire, Inc.
BREDA, NORWAY -- (MARKET WIRE) -- Feb 28, 2008 --
Dockwise Ltd. (DOCK): Annual Report 2007. Bermuda, 28 February 2008
Please be advised that as of today, 28 February 2008, CET 16:00 hrs. the Annual Report 2007 of Dockwise Ltd. is available on the company's website www.dockwise.com under tab "News".
About Dockwise Ltd./the Dockwise Group
Dockwise Ltd. has a workforce of more than 1200 people both offshore and onshore. The company is the leading marine contractor providing total transport services to the offshore, onshore and yachting industries as well as installation services of extremely heavy offshore platforms. The group is headquartered in Bermuda with amongst others operational offices in Breda, The Netherlands. The group's main commercial offices are located in The Netherlands, the United States, China, Korea, Australia and Nigeria. The Dockwise Yacht Transport business unit is headquartered in Fort Lauderdale and has offices in France and Italy. The Dockwise Shipping network is supported by agents in Japan, Singapore, Spain, Argentina, Australia and Italy.
To support all of its services to customers, the group includes three engineering centers in Houston, Breda and Shenzen, manufactures specific motion reduction equipment such as LMU (Leg Mating Units) and DMU (Deck Mating Units) and owns a fleet of 22 purpose built semi-submersible vessels of which currently 17 are operational and 5 will become operational during 2008.
Dockwise shares are listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange under ticker DOCK.
For further information: www.dockwise.com
This document contains certain forward-looking statements relating to the business, financial performance and results of the Company and/or the industry in which it operates. Forward-looking statements concern future circumstances and results and other statements that are not historical facts, sometimes identified by the words "believes", "expects", "predicts", "intends", "projects", "plans", "estimates", "aims", "foresees", "anticipates", "targets", and similar expressions. The forward-looking statements, contained in this document, including assumptions, opinions and views of the Company or cited from third party sources are solely opinions and forecasts which are uncertain and subject to risks. A multitude of factors can cause actual events to differ significantly from any anticipated development. Neither the Company nor any of its subsidiary undertakings nor any of its officers or employees guarantees that the assumptions underlying such forward-looking statements are free from errors nor does any of the foregoing accept any responsibility for the future accuracy of the opinions expressed in this document or the actual occurrence of the forecasted developments.
No representation or warranty (express or implied) is made as to, and no reliance should be placed on, any information, including projections, estimates, targets and opinions, contained herein, and no liability whatsoever is accepted as to any errors, omissions or misstatements contained herein, and, accordingly, neither the Company nor any of its subsidiary undertakings nor any such person's officers or employees accepts any liability whatsoever arising directly or indirectly from the use of this document.
Note not for publication: For further information, please contact:
Analysts Fons van Lith [phone] (cellphone) Tel: [phone] [e-mail] Manager Investor Relations & Corporate Legal Counsel
Press Jacqueline van den Bergen + 31622448435 (cellphone) Tel: [phone] [e-mail] Manager Internal and External Communications
Copyright © Hugin AS 2008. All rights reserved.
Document ITWR000020080228e42s004ms

Announcement: Annual Report 2007 Dockwise Ltd. online available
561 words

28 February 2008

Hugin Press Release

HUGNEN

English

(c) 2008
Dockwise Ltd. (DOCK): Annual Report 2007.
Bermuda, 28 February 2008
Please be advised that as of today, 28 February 2008, CET 16:00 hrs.
the Annual Report 2007 of Dockwise Ltd. is available on the company's website www.dockwise.com under tab "News".
About Dockwise Ltd./the Dockwise Group
Dockwise Ltd. has a workforce of more than 1200 people both offshore and onshore. The company is the leading marine contractor providing total transport services to the offshore, onshore and yachting industries as well as installation services of extremely heavy offshore platforms. The group is headquartered in Bermuda with amongst others operational offices in Breda, The Netherlands. The group's main commercial offices are located in The Netherlands, the United States, China, Korea, Australia and Nigeria. The Dockwise Yacht Transport business unit is headquartered in Fort Lauderdale and has offices in France and Italy. The Dockwise Shipping network is supported by agents in Japan, Singapore, Spain, Argentina, Australia and Italy.
To support all of its services to customers, the group includes three engineering centers in Houston, Breda and Shenzen, manufactures specific motion reduction equipment such as LMU (Leg Mating Units) and DMU (Deck Mating Units) and owns a fleet of 22 purpose built semi-submersible vessels of which currently 17 are operational and 5 will become operational during 2008.
Dockwise shares are listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange under ticker DOCK.
For further information: www.dockwise.com
This document contains certain forward-looking statements relating to the business, financial performance and results of the Company and/or the industry in which it operates. Forward-looking statements concern
future circumstances and results and other statements that are not

historical facts, sometimes identified by the words "believes",

"expects", "predicts", "intends", "projects", "plans", "estimates",

"aims", "foresees", "anticipates", "targets", and similar

expressions. The forward-looking statements, contained in this

document, including assumptions, opinions and views of the Company or

cited from third party sources are solely opinions and forecasts

which are uncertain and subject to risks. A multitude of factors can

cause actual events to differ significantly from any anticipated

development. Neither the Company nor any of its subsidiary

undertakings nor any of its officers or employees guarantees that the

assumptions underlying such forward-looking statements are free from

errors nor does any of the foregoing accept any responsibility for


the future accuracy of the opinions expressed in this document or the actual occurrence of the forecasted developments.
No representation or warranty (express or implied) is made as to, and no reliance should be placed on, any information, including projections, estimates, targets and opinions, contained herein, and no liability whatsoever is accepted as to any errors, omissions or misstatements contained herein, and, accordingly, neither the Company nor any of its subsidiary undertakings nor any such person's officers or employees accepts any liability whatsoever arising directly or indirectly from the use of this document.
Note not for publication:
For further information, please contact:
Analysts
Fons van Lith [phone] (cellphone) Tel: [phone]
[e-mail]
Manager Investor Relations & Corporate Legal Counsel
Press
Jacqueline van den Bergen + 31622448435 (cellphone) Tel: [phone]
[e-mail]
Manager Internal and External Communications
http://hugin.info/137711/R/1196457/243145.pdf
Document HUGNEN0020080228e42s003s5
Pensions Week: Special Focus: Growth spurt.
Martin Fagan

1,281 words

25 February 2008

Pensions Week

PENWEE

English

(c) 2008 Pensions Week
News that Chinalco, the state-owned aluminium corporation of China, had buddied up with American giant Alcoa to take a GBP7.2bn joint stake in Anglo- Australian mining company Rio Tinto is proof the west needs to rethink their approach to emerging markets.
And yet the National Association of Pension Funds Annual Survey 2007 shows only a modest increase in equities devoted to emerging markets, rising from 1.1% in 2006 to 1.2 % last year. This compares to a median exposure of 5% by global equity managers, according to figures from Mercer.
Meanwhile, the market is evolving so rapidly, some question whether countries classified as emerging markets, are still 'emerging'.
Alistair Wilson, head of institutional business at Neptune Asset Management, says: "What we generally refer to as emerging markets - China, Brazil, Russia - are now massive economies that don't really conform to the World Bank's definition of an emerging market.
"China Life is the world's biggest insurance stock, so I would say that's the product of a market that's finally emerged. Because of that, I prefer to call them non-OECD [Organisation for Economic Cooperation & Development] markets."
Debbie Clarke, principal at global consultants Mercer, is also someone who would say pension funds have to rethink their whole approach to emerging markets. "As a sector, in 2007, it was up by 40% in real terms, which is not something pension fund trustees can ignore," says Clarke. "Brazil, Russia India and China - the BRIC bloc - are less likely to be considered emerging markets and are more likely to be included in a global equity fund."
So when we say emerging markets, to which countries are we actually referring? The S&P IFCG Index of emerging market economies numbers 35 constituents, among which are not only Russia, China, Brazil, India and Poland, but also Nigeria, the Philippines and Zimbabwe. Just as one man's ceiling is another man's floor, so which countries constitute an emerging market differs depending on who you ask. For investment institutions, certain countries in Africa - Nigeria, Zambia and Ghana for example - constitute emerging markets, while some view them as 'frontier markets' dominated by companies too small, and too thinly traded to be of 'investable' quality.
"The factors that have derailed developing economies in the past - political instability, bad economic management, devalued currencies and so on - are no longer the threat," says Clarke. "In fact, the US is carrying a huge budget deficit that poses a very real threat to its economy, whereas China, Russia and Brazil have virtually no debt and are running surpluses."
Paul Black, investment partner at Lane Clark & Peacock, believes that, in the long term, these economies are no riskier than anywhere else in the developed world. "In the very short term these markets will have a correction," says Black. "But if a pension fund allocates a small percentage of its capital and spreads it over these markets and invests with a long-term view to ride out the volatility, this will reduce the risk enormously."
And despite pension funds looking to diversify a slice of their capital into the emerging market economies, one fear is that a finite supply of stock will either create a valuation 'bubble' or else persuade some pension trustees to ignore the sector all together. A recent report from UBS says: "Pension participation in emerging markets is now firmly established, but the relatively small size of the asset class will prevent it from becoming a major component of most funds."
LCP's Black agrees with this prognosis but only "for the foreseeable future". Black thinks as these markets develop, huge populations with growing aspirations demanding an ever greater diversity of goods and services means more companies will emerge. For these firms to grow they will need capital, and will raise this on their country's stock exchange. "This will mean a steady supply of IPOs to the markets which hopefully will meet the demands of potential buyers," adds Black.
One major pension fund has already made a move to increase its exposure to emerging markets. Last November, Ireland's National Pensions Reserve Fund announced a tender competition for approximately 600m (GBP449m) of active equity mandates in order to increase its emerging markets allocation. The fund is to raise its strategic allocation to emerging market equities to 5% of total assets from 2% currently.
"Increasingly, pension funds are seeking more alpha and emerging markets have the characteristics to deliver this," says Mark Roxburgh, executive officer at Nomura Asset Management. "We've recently seen an increase in mandates from pension funds seeking exposure to this area."
Roxburgh says pension funds can no longer ignore the performance of these markets. "Although the emerging markets universe fell 12% in January [2008], over the year [January 2007-January 2008] it's up 23.7%. Compare the same period for the Dow Jones Index - up 0.53% - and the FTSE - up 0.63% - and it seems these markets have finally matured. They still have signs of vulnerability, but they're more resilient than in the past and not as correlated with western markets as was previously thought. The subprime crisis affected western markets far more than it affected emerging markets."
And as China seeks an existence beyond being the developed world's metal basher, and India has proven itself a location where software can be developed for a fraction of the cost of the west; where Brazil is selling 'soft' commodities (such as grain, sugar, coffee and ethanol) the west seems unable to grow itself and Russia has become a major player in the oil and gas markets; the investment potential of these markets is hard to ignore.
"But Russia isn't just an oil and gas story," says Wilson. "True, Russia has used revenue from the sale of these commodities to the west to pay off its debts, but it has a booming consumer sector and its people are eager to buy consumer goods, to the extent that it'll soon overtake Germany as the biggest market for consumer goods in Europe."
Clarke echoes Wilson's sentiments on consumer consumption, but adds: "Emerging markets do lag behind developed, more mature markets of the west," she says. "The ownership of consumer items that we in the west view as commonplace - cars, computers, mobile phones and the like - is growing in many developing economies. But, as prosperity and disposable income increases, I think the take-up of these goods in these economies will happen far faster than it did in the west."
The latest forecast from the International Monetary Fund, released in January, highlights emerging markets will be "the engine of global growth" in 2008. Simon Johnson, chief economist at Gartmore Asset Management, expects GDP growth in emerging markets to average 6.9% this year, much higher than that forecast in mature markets, with anticipated GDP growth of 1.5% for the US and Japan in 2008, and 1.6% for the eurozone. "This [forecast] includes consideration of growth decelerating from 11.4% to 10% in China, which should help to alleviate some concerns about its economy overheating," says Johnson.
Black feels the growth in these developing economies is sustainable, even though there might be the odd economic and market hiccup along the way.
"The populations of these countries will get relatively very prosperous very rapidly and look for ways to spend their income," he says. "And this will help economic growth and GDP growth; what's more, this rate of growth will outstrip that of the developed world for a long time to come."
Martin Fagan is a freelance journalist
62565440
Document PENWEE0020080303e42p0000u

US said losing space markets, hobbled by own policy
By Jim Wolf

709 words

19 February 2008

02:45 PM

Reuters News

LBA

English

(c) 2008 Reuters Limited
WASHINGTON, Feb 19 (Reuters) - Even as the United States plans a high-profile shoot-down of a wayward satellite, a new report shows Russia, China and others are gaining space market share -- aided by a U.S. policy that some say has misfired.
Far from blocking the rise of foreign space capabilities, U.S. export controls tightened nearly 10 years ago had the opposite effect in some cases, an expert panel drawn largely from industry said in a study released on Tuesday.
"The grand strategic intent of the space export controls is not being achieved," said the report put out by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington research group.
The report did not address the coming U.S. effort to shoot down a disabled spy satellite for the first time before it tumbles from orbit -- an operation that could take place as soon as Thursday.
National security officials have said the planned shoot-down, using an anti-ballistic missile interceptor from a ship in the Pacific, is designed to protect populated areas from space debris and toxic fuel, not showcase an expanding U.S. missile-defense shield with space-based sensors.
The United States tightened space technology-transfer rules in 1999 after congressional investigators found China had acquired sensitive technologies from U.S.-built commercial satellites then being launched by the Chinese.
The new rules put commercial communications satellites, subsystems and components on a munitions list subject to State Department licensing even if similar products could be easily bought worldwide.
The U.S. State Department had no immediate comment on the report.
In the global communications satellite market -- where the United States enjoyed a technical edge over international competitors in the 1990s -- the gap with competitors has "significantly closed" in the last decade, the report said.
The U.S. share of global space markets is steadily declining and U.S. companies are increasingly hard-put to cash in on foreign markets, it said. "U.S. preeminence in space is under challenge in many areas."
The export-control regime is designed to enhance U.S. national security but "did not do what it intended," said Pierre Chao, one of the study's three co-chairs, at a briefing on the findings. "In some cases, it had the opposite effect."
For instance, Russia was sharing relevant know-how with China, Europe and India even as the United States had shied from doing so, the report said.
The study said the overall financial health of the top manufacturers in the U.S. space industrial -- by implication, companies like Lockheed Martin Corp, Boeing Co and Northrop Grumman Corp -- was "good," despite the U.S. industry's loss of share overseas.
But it said U.S. access to foreign innovation and "human capital" was getting tougher. The U.S. space industrial base is largely dependent on U.S. national-security spending, it added.
The study found space-faring nations were continuing to make strides even without access to U.S. technology that once made the United States part of a "very exclusive club."
For instance, Russia, France, Israel, South Korea and India all now possess commercial imaging satellites sharp enough to pick out objects on the ground one meter (one yard) long or less, the report said.
In addition, Canada, the European Space Agency, Italy, Germany and Japan each possess civil radar imaging satellites, with India and Argentina soon to join the list, it said.
Since 1999, China, for its part, has launched an indigenous navigation system, conducted its first manned spaceflight, tested an antisatellite missile, sold the first Chinese-built satellite to a foreign buyer (Nigeria) and launched its first lunar probe. China also has launched two military radar imaging satellites, the report said.
Jeffrey Foust, a space and telecommunications expert at Futron Corp, a Bethesda, Maryland consultancy, said U.S. policy had backfired in space.
"The U.S. is actually hurting national security by making it more difficult for the space companies it depends on to compete in the global market," he said. (Reporting by Jim Wolf; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)
USA-SPACE/|LANGEN|AFA|CSA|LBY|RWSA|RWS|REULB|GNS|ABX|BNX|SXNA
Document LBA0000020080219e42j001kw

US said losing space markets, hobbled by own policy
By Jim Wolf

708 words

19 February 2008

02:44 PM

Reuters News

LBA

English

(c) 2008 Reuters Limited
WASHINGTON, Feb 19 (Reuters) - Even as the United States plans a high-profile shoot-down of a wayward satellite, a new report shows Russia, China and others are gaining space market share -- aided by a U.S. policy that some say has misfired.
Far from blocking the rise of foreign space capabilities, U.S. export controls tightened nearly 10 years ago had the opposite effect in some cases, an expert panel drawn largely from industry said in a study released on Tuesday.
"The grand strategic intent of the space export controls is not being achieved," said the report put out by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington research group.
The report did not address the coming U.S. effort to shoot down a disabled spy satellite for the first time before it tumbles from orbit -- an operation that could take place as soon as Thursday.
National security officials have said the planned shoot-down, using an anti-ballistic missile interceptor from a ship in the Pacific, is designed to protect populated areas from space debris and toxic fuel, not showcase an expanding U.S. missile-defense shield with space-based sensors.
The United States tightened space technology-transfer rules in 1999 after congressional