Exxon Mobil Plans 20 New Global Projects in Next 3 Years
HOUSTON (AP) — Exxon Mobil Corp., the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, said Wednesday it plans to begin more than 20 new global projects in the next three years, investments expected to add 1 million oil-equivalent barrels a day to its volumes.
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The Irving, Texas-based company said its project inventory at the end of 2006 has the potential to develop 24 billion oil-equivalent barrels.
Chairman and CEO Rex Tillerson said Exxon Mobil’s capital spending would be about $20 billion a year through the end of the decade. The company’s capital spending tab in 2006 was nearly $20 billion, up $2.2 billion from 2005.
“Market and geopolitical forces continue to shape the environment in which we operate,” Tillerson told analysts during a presentation at the New York Stock Exchange. “Our view of what it takes to be successful in this industry has not changed. It requires consistency, integrity, discipline, reliability and ingenuity.”
Tillerson also said the company had decided to turn over operational control of a joint venture project in Venezuela’s oil-rich Orinoco River region to its partner, Petroleos de Venezuela SA, Venezuela’s government-controlled oil company. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez ordered by decree last week the takeover of oil projects run by foreign oil companies in the Orinoco region.
But Tillerson said discussions continue over the ownership stake of its Venezuelan operations and other aspects of the arrangements.
“There’s a lot that has to be discussed with the Venezuelans yet,” he said. “It’ll be some time, I suspect, before we come to any conclusion on our continuing participation in the joint venture or our exit from the joint venture on terms that everybody is satisfied with.”
During the three-hour session, Tillerson pointed out the company’s return on investment, noting Exxon Mobil led the industry in 2006 with return on capital employed of 32 percent, 50 percent higher than its competitors.
Last month, Exxon Mobil posted the largest annual profit by a U.S. company — $39.5 billion — although its earnings for the last quarter of 2006 declined 4 percent.
The record annual earnings followed a year of extraordinarily high energy prices as crude oil topped $78 a barrel in the summer — driving up average gasoline prices in the United States to more than $3 a gallon. Prices retreated later in the year.
The fourth-quarter decline reflected lower profits from Exxon’s refining and marketing operations and a sharp drop-off in natural gas prices.
Exxon shares rose 96 cents to $71.96 in early afternoon trading on the New York Stock Exchange. The shares have traded in a range of $56.64 to $79 in the past year.
