The investing environment for oil & gas producers remains bullish in 2008, as record oil prices headline the news almost daily… and analysts see a lot more coming. Since Goldman Sachs predicted a two-year move to $200 in the commodity, people have had renewed confidence in buying up companies that deal with oil, and its cleaner alternative, natural gas.

More than 21,000 people working for KBR in Iraq - including about 10,500 Americans - are listed as employees of two companies that exist in a computer file on the fourth floor of a building on a palm-studded boulevard in the Caribbean.