China's sovereign wealth fund has spent about £1 billion sterling on shares in oil giant GP, The Guardian reports. Last month China - thanks to being overburdened with spare cash - splashed another £1 billion sterling on a stake in French oil firm Total.
Given that China was quick to point to the economic consequences of rubbing them up the wrong way during the minor diplomatic spat with Ireland this week, and the much bigger falling out with France, it'll be interesting to see how they use their newfound economic might.
The British government has already expressed mild unease over the idea of foreign countries controlling energy companies. As noted previously, China and the oil-rich middle eastern nations will soon own us all.
On a related note, I thought I'd include the graph above which shows who has oil - and who doesn't. It's skewed to represent the amount of oil each country has.
As you can see, Europe is bunched. China is relatively small given its actual size, which is probably why they are upping their control of oil in Africa and buying into international energy giants.
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