Who is the best explorer? Comparing ExxonMobil, Eni, TotalEnergies, BP, Shell and Chevron, asking who preserved the capability to find new resources, who lost strategic continuity, and who ultimately had to buy barrels discovered by somebody else.
Shell wants investors to place greater value on its trading and supply business, but outsiders still cannot see clearly how much it earns, how risks are controlled or how durable its advantage really is.
Before I began researching this article, I assumed ConocoPhillips was a relatively simple corporate story. It had spun off Phillips 66, disposed of much of its international inheritance and concentrated on unconventional oil and gas in the Lower 48. Successive purchases of Concho Resources, Shell’s Permian assets and Marathon
Occidental Petroleum's 2014 spin-off of California Resources Corporation was more than a corporate separation. It was a high-stakes capital allocation decision that unlocked value for some shareholders, transferred risk to others and exposed the dangers of leverage in a cyclical industry.
Tullow Oil built one of the industry’s most admired exploration franchises, but debt, development risk and operational underperformance eventually overwhelmed the company’s discoveries.
Albert Manifold was hired to help remake BP and removed just thirty-three days after shareholders confirmed him as chairman. His fall exposed a deeper struggle over the company’s strategy, board and future direction.
🎧 Prefer to listen? Chevrons different bet0:00/2309.549661× We previously examined how Shell changed after acquiring BG Group in 2016. The deal deepened Shell’s exposure to natural gas, LNG and the increasingly complex markets through which gas molecules are produced, traded, transported and sold. Over the following decade,
The oil majors have spent the past decade responding to one major disruption after another. The collapse in oil prices in late 2014 forced deep spending cuts and portfolio repair. Then the energy transition pushed management teams to decide how quickly the industry would change, what that meant for oil
Two oil majors reporting similar earnings per share, dividend yields and apparently respectable shareholder returns may look the same, but their overall performance can still be fundamentally different. One may be growing in value, and therefore increasing its future earning capacity, while still paying shareholders returns that are competitive with
The Financial Times recently published a substantial profile piece of ExxonMobil and its chief executive, Darren Woods, under the title The King of Big Oil. The title suggests a conventional story about operational success, scale and corporate recovery. Those elements are there to begin with, but the article then becomes
Genel Energy has announced a recommended cash offer for Capricorn Energy, valuing the company at approximately $360 million on a fully diluted basis. Shareholders have been offered $4.74 per share, comprising $3.75 in cash from Genel and a $0.99 special dividend from Capricorn. The total package is
I have written a lot recently about what oil companies got wrong: the retreat from exploration, the confusion of transition strategy with corporate identity, and the tendency of boards to mistake a fashionable market narrative for durable industrial reality. This article is about the other side of that argument. Eni
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I left the upstream oil and gas industry and joined my first investment bank in February 2014. After more than 20 years in the industry, I knew the sector from the inside, but the first few months in banking were still a different kind of education: learning how companies, strategies,
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European oil majors treated the extraordinary conditions of 2020 and 2021 as evidence of a durable industrial future. This article examines how cheap money, inflated valuations and policy momentum distorted strategy.
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Gunvor has backed Western Natural Resources, an Oklahoma City-based private oil and gas producer, as it builds a portfolio of US natural gas assets. Reuters reported that Gunvor provided capital to support Western’s roughly $300 million acquisition of gas-producing assets in the Haynesville shale, one of the
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On 12 October 1964, a ship called Methane Princess sailed up the Thames Estuary and berthed at Canvey Island, a low-lying stretch of reclaimed marshland better known for sea walls and mudflats than making energy history. She had sailed from Arzew, Algeria, with a cargo of liquefied natural gas.
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Reports that ExxonMobil is evaluating acquisitions are not really about any single target. Woodside Energy is one name in the headlines today, but the bigger question is Exxon itself. After Pioneer, Exxon has been rewarded for discipline and visible growth from the Permian and Guyana. Its 2030 plan leans heavily
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BP is reportedly marketing minority interests in two of its most important future Gulf of Mexico developments, in what appears to be a farm-down with BP retaining operatorship. The assets are substantial and both are prestige pieces within the BP portfolio. Kaskida, targeting first oil in 2029, is BP’
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There was a time when AIM was one of the natural homes for junior oil and gas companies. It was a market where exploration stories could get funded, overlooked acreage could find an audience, and small companies with big ambitions could raise meaningful money. In the years before the financial
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EnQuest announced today a major acquisition of Malaysian production assets. The enlarged group is expected to produce more than 100 kboepd, with Southeast Asia representing 69% of 2025 production on a pro forma basis. This is a hugely significant event for EnQuest. It has clearly taken years of work to
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The final phase of UK North Sea consolidation is surely approaching fast. BP has reportedly been reviewing its UK North Sea upstream business as part of a broader portfolio reset. BP’s UK upstream business is special because it is not just a run-off package. A large part of
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The UK North Sea is out of favour. Assets are being valued under a fiscal and political cloud. Sellers are under pressure, capital is scarce and public market valuations reflect little obvious upside. For companies with scale, liquidity, operating capability and shareholder return policies, that environment can be an opportunity
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The rise and fall of Hurricane Energy offers one of the most revealing case studies in modern upstream oil & gas investing. At first glance, the company appears to represent a familiar narrative: a technically ambitious exploration company that attracted substantial investor enthusiasm before ultimately disappointing on reservoir performance. Viewed