bp plc

Like they say: If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. With the price of home heating oil on the rise, and likely to go on rising due to global politics, now might be a good time to place a bet on oil to hedge against the costs of keeping the homestead warm.

BP has big problems, and not just because of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and the $20 billion compensation fund it set up to pay the victims. The petro-giant has been missing Wall Street's profit targets lately, thanks to sloppy operations and a general trend toward lower gasoline consumption.

Bank of America did the right thing this week, nixing its notorious $5 a month debit card fee before it began. But B of A can't win, and even now, financial journalists are wondering how it will find ways to nickel and dime its way back from this week's fee retreat at the expense of its customers.

Facing widespread calls for boycotts, owners responded by hammering home the message that the U.K. oil company doesn't own most of the retail locations that bear its name. Now as anger fades, business is coming back, and few owners ditched the brand.

Stephen Baldwin has sued fellow actor Kevin Costner over the sale of technology used to help clean the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Baldwin says Costner owes him a share of an $18 million deposit that BP made as part of a larger purchase.

BP is apparently considering the $1 billion sale of some of its assets in the North Sea as it tries to cover cleanup costs from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. The company's Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico exploded in April, leading to the most massive oil spill in U.S. history.

The U.S. Interior Department has accused the White House of misrepresenting scientists' views to imply they were in favor of an oil-drilling ban. In actuality, the scientists hadn't been asked for their opinions on whether the ban would do any good, according to a department report.

The lead investigator for the presidential panel's investigation of April's Deepwater Horizon oil-spill disaster that killed 11 workers refuted previous reports that the rig's majority owner BP Plc and contractor Halliburton Co. compromised safety by cutting corners during the rig's construction, the New York Times reported.

In a move aimed at boosting economic activity, the Obama administration has reopened the Gulf of Mexico to oil and gas drilling about six weeks ahead of schedule. The Gulf had been closed to drilling after the three-month BP oil spill, the worst such spill in history.

The White House blocked government scientists' efforts to disclose the worst-case environmental scenario related to the April 20 explosion of BP's Deepwater Horizon rig, the Associated Press reported Wednesday, citing a panel appointed by President Barack Obama to examine the spill.