Sale of 4 Gulf oil fields brings BP $650 million

Oil behemoth BP �(NYSE: BP) continues to shed assets as it seeks to fund its agreed $20 billion escrow fund to pay for damages caused by the explosion of its Macondo well last April in the Gulf of Mexico and the oil spill. In all, BP plans to sell $30 billion in assets to meet what it estimates will be claims totaling more than $32 billion.

The company’s latest sale includes four producing fields in the Gulf of Mexico for $650 million to Japan’s Marubeni Oil and Gas. The four fields were acquired from Devon Energy (NYSE: DVN) in March.

In what looks to be a slap at the company’s former CEO, Tony Hayward, BP noted “that these four fields did not fit well the rest of our business in the region.” Perhaps when it bought the fields the company just had too much cash and it was burning a hole in its pockets. That’s no longer the problem.

In a separate statement, new BP CEO Bob Dudley stated that BP has no plans to cease its U.S. operations. According to AFP, Dudley said, “BP will not be quitting America.”

Dudley noted that BP suffered “a major loss of value and a loss of trust” as a result of the Macondo disaster. But BP does not intend to quit deepwater exploration and drilling, according to Dudley. He said that 7% of the world’s supply of oil now comes from deepwater and he believes that will rise to 9% by 2020.

“(BP is) one of only a handful of companies with the financial and technological strengths to undertake development projects in these difficult geographies. And it can be done safely,” Dudley said.

He might have added that only a company with the vast resources of a BP could possibly hope to pay the costs of a major disaster like the one in the Gulf.

In its report, The Wall Street Journal noted� that Dudley also took a shot at politicians and the media, saying that “the protracted media and political firestorm (surroun! ding the blowout) threatened the very existence of our company.” There are probably still plenty of people who believe that such a threat should become a reality.

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