BP could pay megabucks in oil-spill costs

The oil spill spreading across the Gulf of Mexico has drained US$32 billion ($44 billion) from BP's stock market value. Lawsuits, fines, cleanup and reputation-repair are certain to cost the company billions more and could tie up BP for many years to come.

Yet the still-unfolding environmental disaster isn't likely to put one of the world's largest oil companies out of business.

BP earned close to US$40 billion in 2008 and 2009 combined, and more than US$6 billion in the first three months of 2010.

Exxon Mobil - which shelled out more than US$4 billion in cleanup costs and legal payouts after the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska 21 years ago - managed to pull through the disaster just fine. Today it is the world's largest publicly traded oil company.

In the long run, BP will be fine too, said Mark Gilman, an analyst at The Benchmark Co.

"Let's not get hysterical here," he said. "They're going to survive this."

Still, London-based BP will face a litany of challenges as a result of last month's accident, not the least of which will be scrutiny from politicians and regulators in Washington.

BP could find itself at a competitive disadvantage when vying for offshore drilling permits if the Obama Administration moves ahead with plans to open vast swathes of the US coast to oil exploration.

How much the disaster costs depends on how much worse the spill becomes, and how much fault is ultimately assigned to BP for the oil-rig explosion and fire that caused the spill.

The oil company leased the offshore platform from Transocean and hired subcontractors, including Halliburton, to help drill the well that is now spewing an estimated 757,060 litres a day.

Yesterday, BP gave assurances to shrimpers, oil workers and scores of others that they would be compensated for any "legitimate and objectively verifiable" claims.

BP is spending US$6 million a day to contain the oil spill; the federal Oil Pollution Act requires BP to pay the cost of any cleanup work done by government agencies such as the Coast Guard and Homeland Security. But the real costs will come later, when BP starts paying for damage to wildlife, coastal businesses and tourism.

"The worst-case scenario is enormous," said Keith Hall, a New Orleans lawyer who represents oil and gas companies. "There are already a number of wrongful-death and personal injury cases out there. There will be no doubt more."

Fadel Gheit, a market analyst with Oppenheimer & Co, estimated that every day that oil seeps into the gulf, BP faces hundreds of millions of dollars more in liability claims.

Overall, Gheit estimated BP could pay anywhere between US$5 billion and US$15 billion for the cleanup, damage claims and lawsuits.

Federal law sets a US$75 million limit on how much an oil company has to pay for damages such as lost wages and economic suffering. But lawyers said the cap can be lifted if BP is found to have failed to meet federal safeguards or was otherwise grossly negligent.

People can also pursue claims in state court and file for damages through the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, which was established after the Exxon Valdez.

The fund, which collects 8c from the industry for every barrel of oil produced or imported to the US, has about US$1.6 billion available to cover damages.

David Kotok, chief investment officer of the Sarasota, Florida, money-management firm Cumberland Advisors, said early predictions were likely to understate the fallout from the disaster.

Neither the 1969 Santa Barbara, California, offshore oil spill nor the Exxon Valdez was a useful comparison because the current slick could be much bigger and harder to contain.

"We're looking at maybe two to three months" of oil flowing into the gulf, he said. "The devastation is huge. This is like Three Mile Island."

Experts say the green image BP cultivated in its advertisements is vulnerable. Market researcher Eileen Campbell valued BP's brand at US$17.3 billion, mostly because of its interest in the environment. BP invests in biofuels, wind and solar energy, and it supports capping carbon emissions.

The spill will probably make it tougher for BP to expand in US waters, analysts say.

"BP is under watch now," Gheit said.

"They may not be welcome in the area. So if I'm going to issue a permit for BP to drill a well, I'm going to take a much closer look at them."

- AP