If you thought that BP was going to suddenly come up with $20 Billion Dollars for compensation claims, then the JOKE IS ON YOU.
The New York Times is reporting that BP has an undefined "Several Years" to pay the money in to the fund that is to be administered by Ken Feinberg, Current "Pay Czar", and the mediator who oversaw the 9/11 victims compensation fund.
From the Times:
The agreement was not final and was still being negotiated when President Obama and his top advisers met Wednesday morning with BP’s top executives and lawyers. The preliminary terms would give BP several years to deposit the full amount into the fund so it could better manage cash flow, maintain its financial viability and not scare off investors.
http://www.nytimes.com/...
Looks like hiring Jamie Gorelick to represent BP in the talks with the White House have paid big dividends for BP.
Sorry folks, if you can't smell the stink coming off of this, you must not have a nose. The rhetoric isn't matching the reality, yet again.
More:
The tentative agreement comes a day after Mr. Obama addressed the nation from the Oval Office, when he told Americans that he planned to tell the chairman of BP, Carl-Henric Svanberg, "that he is to set aside whatever resources are required to compensate the workers and business owners who have been harmed as a result of his company’s recklessness."
There have been plenty of diaries about last night's speech, I don't need to get in to that. But this isn't what it's being spun to be.