http://chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/business/3335685

i knew Bush and his buddies would eventually get the better end of the deal in this disaster

9/5/2005 1:05:09 AM

storm cleanup at Navy bases, if you read it. It stays in the system.

Quote :

"The Navy has hired Houston-based Halliburton Co. to restore electric power, repair roofs and remove debris at three naval facilities in Mississippi damaged by Hurricane Katrina. ADVERTISEMENT Halliburton subsidiary KBR will also perform damage assessments at other naval installations in New Orleans as soon as it is safe to do so. KBR was assigned the work under a "construction capabilities" contract awarded in 2004 after a competitive bidding process. The company is not involved in the Army Corps of Engineers' effort to repair New Orleans' levees. MANUFACTURING Cooper Cameron buys Dresser units Houston-based Cooper Cameron Corp. has agreed to buy certain businesses from Dallas-based Dresser for $224 million. Cooper Cameron announced it is buying operations that make valves and other controls used by the oil and gas business. The operations are in the U.S. and six other countries and sell under names such as Grove, TK and Wheatley. Revenues for the acquired businesses were $400 million in 2004 and earned a modest profit, according to Cooper Cameron. It predicted revenues will rise to $480 million for the current year. ENERGY Pioneer announces stock buyback plan DALLAS - Pioneer Natural Resources Co., an independent oil and gas driller, said Thursday it will buy back $1 billion of its stock, raise its dividend 20 percent and exit exploration in the deep-water Gulf of Mexico. The share buyback program would represent about 15 percent of Irving-based Pioneer's market value. Pioneer plans to pay for the shares through borrowing and selling assets, including some in the Gulf and Argentina. The company said the moves would focus on onshore drilling in North America and result in more consistent production."

[Edited on September 5, 2005 at 1:07 AM. Reason : .]

9/5/2005 1:07:13 AM

i remeber back in the day when people deciding if we should go to war werent allowed to personaly profit from the defense contracts from said war...

what an innocent time.

[Edited on September 5, 2005 at 1:11 AM. Reason : -]

9/5/2005 1:11:24 AM

Quote :

"i knew Bush and his buddies would eventually get the better end of the deal in this disaster"

Uh ... Halliburton is trying to sell off KBR because it's not doing so well. KBR isn't even Halliburton's core business unit, by any stretch. Analysts think it (along with the frenzy of bad PR) drags the company down.

So "Bush and his buddies" will benefit from this storm by getting revenue to some business unit that provides zero-to-negative actual value to the share price of Halliburton, and which will very likely be sold off in the near future?

Your conclusion is, frankly, just plain stupid.

9/5/2005 1:57:15 AM

^post a source or stfu

9/5/2005 2:04:19 AM

either way that company got hired which means it will get paid for the services

so either way whether KBR is dragging the company down or not "bush and his buddies" are still getting paid for this job

9/5/2005 2:08:32 AM

^^

If I don't post a source, maybe that's because any fuckhead with Google can find it instantly?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halliburton

Choice quotes:

Quote :

"At a meeting for investors and analysts in August 2004, a plan was outlined to divest the KBR division through a possible sale, spin-off or initial public offering. Analysts at Deutsche Bank value KBR at up to $2.15 billion, while others believe it could be worth closer to $3 billion by the time management decides what to do with the business in 2005."

Quote :

"Despite cronyism allegations, the company's contracts in Iraq are much less profitable than its core energy business. They are expected to have generated more than $13 billion in sales by the time they start to expire in 2006 but most offer low margins - less than 2% on average in 2003 and just 1.4% this year for the logistics work."

(if you don't like Wikipedia, feel free to Google to your heart's content)

[Edited on September 5, 2005 at 2:12 AM. Reason : foo]

9/5/2005 2:12:14 AM

^ so growth isnt so great. still -- i think 2% of a few billion is some nice cash.

9/5/2005 2:16:03 AM

Quote :

"so either way whether KBR is dragging the company down or not "bush and his buddies" are still getting paid for this job"

Can you explain to me how you think that works, because I'd really like to know? It may give interesting clues as to what particular flavor of crack you're smoking.

9/5/2005 2:17:00 AM

^^

Halliburton is a public company. That means it's traded on the stock market. That means its investors, which include its executives (and, purportedly, Dick Cheney) get paid when its stock price goes up.

Stock prices go up because profitability increases.

Because "growth isn't so great" for KBR, it's been dragging down the stock price of Halliburton as a whole, which is a much bigger company than KBR. A lot of people lose a lot of money when a biz unit drags down the share price, especially the CEO and his direct charges (and, therefore, Dick Cheney).

If KBR were a good deal for Halliburton, you can damn well bet they would not be thinking of selling it off. The people involved are selling it off because it's costing them money.

2% of a few billion is some nice cash indeed, except when you could be getting 5% of a few billion instead.

9/5/2005 2:26:39 AM

Quote :

"That means its investors, which include its executives (and, purportedly, Dick Cheney) get paid when its stock price goes up."

not quite

dick cheney was a given a 16 million dollar gift when he left haliburton. it was sorta understood that he would pay it back by getting them a contract or two.

[Edited on September 5, 2005 at 3:35 AM. Reason : -]

9/5/2005 3:34:44 AM

http://www.thewolfweb.com/message_topic.aspx?topic=346841

9/5/2005 4:38:53 AM

^^ And if he didn't, what were they going to do to him? Sue him for failure to produce results?
And how do you differentiate the millions they gave him to the millions they give every executive that leaves a company?

As for the other bullshit, Dick Cheney sold all his stock before becoming vice president.

And 1% to 2% return on a corporate investment is horrible! That barely covers the cost of putting it into the bank. The opportunity costs associating with having billions of dollars locked up in a business that barely produces is just horrible. They could have, instead, taken that money and purchased treasury bills and earned several times that amount.

It sounds to me like Haliburton is doing Bush a favor here, not the other way around.

9/5/2005 9:12:49 AM

Quote :

"Don't like message? Punish the messenger Thursday, September 01, 2005 Ten months ago, the top civilian procurement official for the Army Corps of Engineers sent a letter to the Army's acting secretary, detailing apparent irregularities in the awarding of contracts for work in post-war Iraq. It seems that representatives from oil-services giant Halliburton had been given seats at the table in February 2003 - a month before the invasion - while Pentagon officials were looking to determine who would get the work rebuilding Iraq. In June, that same procurement official, Bunnatine H. Greenhouse, was asked by congressional Democrats to testify about what she knew. In that testimony, Greenhouse called the awarding of no-bid contracts to Halliburton "the most blatant and improper contract abuse I have witnessed during the course of my professional career." "

http://www.masslive.com/editorials/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-0/1125560800246600.xml&coll=1

9/5/2005 9:23:46 AM

Quote :

"so growth isnt so great. still -- i think 2% of a few billion is some nice cash."

aahahahahaa its always funny when liberals discuss business and economics

9/5/2005 9:27:05 AM

Someone's prolly shoved their pockets full of cash. I won't be surprised if Halliburton=Enron.

9/5/2005 9:32:17 AM

^^ yeah, like that nutso, poor-ass businessman steve jobs!

9/5/2005 9:50:26 AM

exactly like him.

thats a better example than you might think

9/5/2005 11:28:28 AM

wikipedia. the source of all true and unbiased news.

9/5/2005 11:31:40 AM

hey, don't bash Wiki

9/5/2005 11:41:33 AM

yea - millions of people can't be wrong

9/5/2005 1:25:48 PM

And thus we see why the administration really doesn't give a damn anymore.

From the article:

Quote :

"KBR was assigned the work under a "construction capabilities" contract awarded in 2004 after a competitive bidding process. The company is not involved in the Army Corps of Engineers' effort to repair New Orleans' levees."

from the people:

Quote :

"i knew Bush and his buddies would eventually get the better end of the deal in this disaster"

Quote :

"dick cheney was a given a 16 million dollar gift when he left haliburton. it was sorta understood that he would pay it back by getting them a contract or two. "

Quote :

"Someone's prolly shoved their pockets full of cash. I won't be surprised if Halliburton=Enron."

When you're damned if you do, and damned if you don't, what does it matter what other people think, you're damned anyway.

9/5/2005 2:06:05 PM

OMF Bush conspiracy!!11!!1

9/5/2005 2:44:14 PM

Will someone name one company, other than Halliburton, that is capable of organizing and contracting the building and repair of large amounts of infrastructure?

9/5/2005 10:23:58 PM

Quote :

"Uh ... Halliburton is trying to sell off KBR because it's not doing so well."

Well, guess that will change now.

9/5/2005 10:28:08 PM

^^

Parsons Corporation, for example, is one of KBR's competitors. There are other companies in the infrastructure biz. I dunno what relative capabilities are.

[Edited on September 5, 2005 at 10:30 PM. Reason : foo]

9/5/2005 10:29:50 PM

^^

Doubt it. It's a high-level business decision that deals with KBR's earnings history. Not to mention its bad press, which this will surely engender.

9/5/2005 10:30:37 PM