Oil Rig Setback Shock Hits Bp Profit Hopes

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THE gloom deepened at Britain's largest company, BP, today after the oil giantwas hit by a swathe of City profits downgrades on the back of shock news that its state-of-the-art Thunder Horse oil platform in the Gulf of Mexico will be out of action until 2008.

With bad news at BP piling up - it admitted yesterday that it is in the middle of a full-scale safety audit of its global asset base and near 100,000-strong personnel following last year's fatal explosion at its Texas City refinery and this summer's pipeline corrosion scandal in Alaska - City analysts wielded the red pen on future earnings estimates.

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Oil Rig Setback Shock Hits Bp Profit Hopes

Broker Credit Suisse, which has already been bearish on BP's future profits, said it believes earnings next year wi...

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