GAZPROM - A working meeting between Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee, and Masami Iijima, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Mitsui & Co., Ltd., took place at the 4th Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok.

GAZPROM - A working meeting between Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee, and Yoshihisa Suzuki, President and Chief Operating Officer of Itochu Corporation, took place at the 4th Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok.

GAZPROM - A working meeting between Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee, and Seung-Il Cheong, President and Chief Executive Officer of KOGAS, took place at the 4th Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok.

GAZPROM - A working meeting between Alexey Miller, Chairman of the Gazprom Management Committee, and Tadashi Maeda, Governor of Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), took place at the 4th Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok.

REUTERS - U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures CLc1 were at $69.93 per barrel at 0646 GMT, up 68 cents, or 1 percent, from their last settlement. WTI futures gained 2.5 percent in the previous session. Brent crude futures LCOc1 climbed 30 cents, or 0.4 percent, to $79.36 a barrel. Brent has climbed for four straight sessions, gaining 2.2 percent the previous day.

PLATTS - Putin said the LNG sector in particular was a key focus area for future cooperation, noting that Japanese companies may take part in the planned expansion of Sakhalin 2, Arctic LNG 2 and Baltic LNG projects as well as an LNG transshipment facility in Kamchatka.

PLATTS - "There is a fairly significant combined potential by the countries [participating in the deal] that can increase production and this potential can be used if necessary," Novak said Wednesday.

REUTERS - Saudi Arabia has started marketing U.S. dollar-denominated sukuk, or Islamic bonds, with the issue expected to be around $2 billion in size, a document showed on Wednesday.

REUTERS - State-owned Orano’s new plant in Tricastin, southern France, will account for a quarter of the world’s 60,000-tonne annual uranium hexafluoride (UF6) production capacity when it fully ramps up in 2021 and is set to have the industry’s lowest costs, the company said.

U.S. EIA - EIA expects Brent spot prices will average $73/b in 2018 and $74/b in 2019. EIA expects West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil prices will average about $6/b lower than Brent prices in 2018 and in 2019. NYMEX WTI futures and options contract values for December 2018 delivery that traded during the five-day period ending September 6, 2018, suggest a range of $56/b to $85/b encompasses the market expectation for December WTI prices at the 95% confidence level.

BAKER HUGHES A GE - The worldwide rig count for August 2018 was 2,278, up 27 from the 2,251 counted in July 2018, and up 162 from the 2,116 counted in August 2017.

REUTERS - Benchmark Brent crude oil rose $1.09 a barrel, or 1.4 percent, to a high of $77.92 and was trading at $77.85 by 0900 GMT. U.S. light crude was 70 cents higher at $68.45.

BLOOMBERG - “Based on fundamentals, Russian sovereign risk is still extremely attractive for investors,” he said. “They’d be hard-pushed to find this kind of yield versus risk anywhere else.”

REUTERS - China’s demand for liquefied natural gas (LNG) is expected to grow by 20 percent to 25 percent in 2018 despite heightened trade tensions with the United States, Qatari Energy Minister Mohammed al-Sada said.

REUTERS - Qatargas said on Monday it had agreed on a 22-year deal with PetroChina International Co, a unit of PetroChina Co, to supply China with around 3.4 million tonnes of liquefied natural gas (LNG) annually, as the nation stepped up efforts to combat air pollution.