Presentation :

Following a general trend for marketization in the last two decades, China's National Oil Companies (NOCs) have been transformed into State Owned Enterprises (SOES),notably investing heavily in Latin America. However, attributing Chinese overseas investment completely to government initiatives oversees the importance of profit imperatives driving Chinese companies to expand abroad. This presentation demonstrates that the confusion about NOCs performance can be solved by making an analytical distinction between its business expansion on the one hand and Beijing's oil diplomacy on the other. However, as the companies have to deal with adverse situations, it is evident that they rely on the Chinese state for economic and diplomatic support to overcome their status as ‘latecomers' in the Latin American energy market. This has led to a relationship of convenience and synchronization between the Chinese state's energy strategy and the NOCs' internationalization aims.