With the Gulf oil spill continuing to dominate the talk of Americans, most of the blame has been put on BP.  Public blame could easily be put on Transocean (RIG) as well since they owned the rig that exploded back in April and led to this catastrophe. The way these things usually work out it seems is to focus on one culprit and attempt to kill off such an enemy.  This is definitely how this is playing out since we constantly hear about BP, the BP CEO, etc. rather than anything on Transocean.

One of the immediate results of the situation was BP cancelling its dividend payouts for the rest of 2010 – definitely a major blow to holders of BP stock.  RIG holders, including myself, hope that the dividend – announced in February 2010 to be $3.11 per share (annually) – will not be compromised due to the Gulf incident.

As of now, it looks like RIG is going to escape the incident intact.  While the shares have been punished similarly to BP, we can assume that the dividend is safe for now.  I will definitely be monitoring since I hold the stock.