Risk and return in oilfield asset holdings

Convention suggests that emerging market investment should provide commensurately lower risk or higher returns than comparable assets in developed countries. This study demonstrates that emerging markets contain regulatory specificities that challenge asset valuation model convergence and potentially invert risk return convention. 292 oilfield assets are used to provide evidence that, under upward oil prices, emerging markets are characterized by progressive state participation in oilfield cash flows. Specifically, this work advances the low oil price paradigm of prior oil and gas asset valuation studies and provides evidence that emerging market state participation terms limit the corporate value of globalization for the sector.