May 21- Halliburton Co, the world's second-largest oilfield services company, said on Tuesday that Mexican state oil company Pemex was delaying any significant activity at its Burgos and Chicontepec projects until next year.
LOUISVILLE, Ky.-- A longtime coal operator plans to open seven mines in the heart of the eastern Kentucky coalfields in a venture expected to create more than 250 jobs in a hard-pressed region where several thousand mining jobs have disappeared in recent years.
HARRISBURG, Pa.-- Another natural gas exploration company says it's experimenting with the gas to power huge pump engines that drive the hydraulic fracturing process. Cabot Oil and Gas Corp. said Monday that it successfully tested an engine last month in northern Pennsylvania's Susquehanna County with gas from other wells it had already drilled.
TULSA, Okla.-- Laredo Petroleum is selling its holdings in the Anadarko Basin to EnerVest Ltd. for $438 million. The Anadarko Basin runs through the western part of Oklahoma and into the Texas Panhandle and extends into western Kansas and southeast Colorado. Shares of Laredo Petroleum Holdings Inc. closed at $19.17 Monday.
KUWAIT, May 21- Around 80 percent of workers at Kuwait's main, state-run oil services company are on strike calling for better pay, a union official said on Tuesday, the latest sign of wage pressures in the Gulf Arab country.
NEW DELHI/ SEOUL, May 21- India has slashed Iranian oil imports by almost a fifth since December, the sharpest cut among Asian buyers, in a move that should increase its chances of winning a new U.S. waiver next month on sanctions targeting oil trade with Iran.
LONDON, May 21- Brent oil futures fell towards $104 per barrel on Tuesday on concerns that the U.S. Investors are focussing on the release of minutes of the Fed's last meeting and testimony by Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke to Congress, both scheduled for Wednesday.
*Ghana wants to increase investment in cocoa sector. *Ghana has strong democratic institutions, oil wealth funds. Ghana is used to resource riches: it is already the world's number two cocoa producer and Africa's second-largest gold miner.
MELBOURNE, May 21- A spate of profit warnings from Australian mining services firms suggests the country's "once-in-a-century" resources spending boom may have peaked sooner than companies, economists and policymakers had expected.
*Fresh conflict in Syria supports prices. CHENNAI, India, May 21- Brent crude futures steadied near a two-week high on Tuesday, holding around $105 per barrel as rising Middle East tensions offset concerns about moderating demand growth to keep prices in a tight range.
*Fresh conflict in Syria supports prices. Reports of fresh skirmishes in Syria suggest the civil conflict is at this year's peak, triggering fears it may spread to neighbouring key oil producers, while a weakening dollar added to the support.
PERTH, May 21- U.S. crude futures eased to about $96.50 a barrel in early trading in Asia on Tuesday as ample supplies weighed on prices, despite support from equity markets. *U.S. oil fell 14 cents to $96.57 a barrel by 0023 GMT, after ending 69 cents higher in the previous session. *Brent rose 5 cents to $104.85 a barrel.
"The dollar's move has been pretty strong lately, maybe you're seeing a little more profit taking," said Gene McGillian, an analyst with Tradition Energy in Stamford, Connecticut. MSCI's all-country world equity index rose 0.51 percent to its highest since June 2008.
Among the stock activity stories for Monday, May 20, from AP Business News:. _ Shares of WPX Energy Inc. soared to an all-time high as a hedge fund disclosed a minority stake in the oil and gas company.
Short of a majority in Congress, Pena Nieto's Institutional Revolutionary Party is likely to need support from the conservative National Action Party, or PAN, to see through plans to overhaul state oil giant Pemex and broaden the tax base. "The PAN can't be a satellite of the PRI," Cordero told a news conference in the Senate shortly afterwards.
BOGOTA, May 20- With Colombia's oil reserves stretching to less than seven years, its biggest challenge is boosting exploration and attracting fresh investment to uncap a "world of discovery" in shale oil, the energy minister said.