Hundreds of U.S. Companies - Nearly Half Of Then Small Businesses - Sell To Mexico's Pemex Backed By $900 Million In Ex-im Bank Financing
WASHINGTON, D.C. -A total of 392 U.S. companies - 186 of them small businesses — are selling $1 billion of equipment and services to Mexico's Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) for natural gas and oil field development, backed by $900 million in loan guarantees from the Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im Bank).
Pemex will use the equipment and services — financed by three separate Ex-Im Bank guarantees - for development at 44 locations throughout Mexico under the New Pidiregas Projects (NPP), the Strategic Gas Program (PEG), and the Cantarell oil field project. Exploration programs are on- and off-shore in the states of Veracruz, Tabasco, Tamaulipas, Chiapas, and Campeche states. The projects have been approved by the lower house of Mexico's Congress, and are to be included in its annual national budget.
These transactions show Ex-Im Bank's increasingly wide reach to U.S. small businesses from coast to coast, not only through direct support of small business transactions, but equally importantly through small business participation as sub-suppliers in large export sales such as these, said Ex-Im Bank's Chairman and President James H. Lambright.
Ex-Im Bank's board of directors has approved:
A $350 millon long-term loan gaurantee to support the export of goods and services from 191 U.S companies(91 of them small business) for upstream oil field development at 23 natural gas and crude oil exploration sites on- and off-shore ear the Bay of Campeche, under the NPP. The equipment will be used for field pressure maintenance, field production optimization, refurbishment and exploration to increase national production capacity. BNP Paribas, New York, N.Y., is the gauranteed lender.
A $250 million long-term loan guarantee to support the export of goods and services from 134 U.S. companies (64 of them small businesses) to be used at the Cantarell oil field in the state of Campeche, Mexico's largest field under development. The equipment will be used to maintain field pressure, deepen or drill 58 wells, and complete drilling of 77 development wells, also with the aim of increasing production capacity. ABN Amro Bank N.V., Chicago, Ill., is the guaranteed lender.
A $300 million long-term loan guarantee to support the export of goods and services from 67 U.S. companies (30 of them small businesses) to be used in Mexico's PEG to increase natural gas exploration and production. The program is made up of 20 separate program areas on- and off-shore in Veracruz, Tabasco, Tamaulipas, Chiapas and Campeche. Standard Chartered Bank, New York, N.Y., and Banco Santander Central Hispano, New York, N.Y., are the guaranteed lenders.
U.S. companies involved in the export sales are located from Massachusetts to California and most states in between, including significant representation from Texas and Louisiana.
Small business participation in the three projects in terms of monetary value ranges from 8 to 16 percent. But small businesses account for 47 percent of participants in NPP, 44 percent in PEG, and 48.5 percent in Cantarell.
Over the past six years, Ex-Im Bank has approved $6.33 billion in financing in support of U.S. exports to Pemex.
Ex-Im Bank this year marks its 72nd year of helping finance the sale of U.S. exports, primarily to emerging markets throughout the world. In fiscal year 2005 Ex-Im Bank authorized nearly $14 billion in transactions supporting almost $17.9 billion in U.S. exports. This represented 3,128 transactions, of which 2,617, or over 80%, directly benefited small businesses. Visit Ex-Im Bank's web site at www.exim.bank