"East of Suez"

Texas Corp.'s Chairman Torkild Rieber likes to do things with a minimum of publicity, a maximum of purpose. Last spring the Norwegian-born onetime shipmaster bought from the Mellons' Gulf Oil the famed Barco concession in Colombia, promptly teamed up on a 50-50 basis with Socony-Vacuum for its development (TIME, May 4). Last week Captain Rieber struck another foreign deal with another Standard company, Standard Oil of California. In a terse joint statement from Captain Rieber and Standard's Kenneth Kingsbury it was revealed that Texaco will market all oil produced and refined by California Standard "east of Suez."

In this case "east" meant nearly everything from Egypt to California, from Palestine to Capetown, including Australia and New Zealand. Texaco at present has no commercial production outside the U. S., though foreign business accounts for about 20% of its total sales. California Standard has no retail marketing system "east of Suez." But on the island of Bahrein in the Persian Gulf it does have a great potential supply of crude (see p. 21). Development was started in 1931 and a big refinery is under construction. Yet last year California Standard was able to sell only 1,300,000 bbl. of Bahrein oil. In Saudi Arabia and the Netherland Indies the company has other concessions which may develop into rich producers.

The "east of Suez" agreement provides assured markets for California's Kingsbury, assured sources of supply for Texaco's Rieber.

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