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ExxonMobil
Exxon Mobil Corporation or ExxonMobil (NYSE: XOM) is a multi-national American corporation and a direct descendant of John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil company.[2] Formed on November 30, 1999, by the merger of Exxon and Mobil, ExxonMobil is the world's largest company by revenue, at $377.6 billion for the fiscal year of 2006. It is the second largest corporation by market capitalization, at $517.92 billion on July 20, 2007 after PetroChina[3]. It is the largest of the six oil supermajors with daily production of 6.5m boe (barrels of oil equivalent)[citation needed]. ExxonMobil ranks first in the world in proven oil and gas reserves among corporate oil producers[citation needed], though it is still eclipsed by several of the largest state petroleum producers. Exxon has been the subject of criticism for its business practices and environmental record. Additional recommended knowledge
OrganizationThe Exxon Mobil Corporation global headquarters are located in Irving, Texas. ExxonMobil markets products around the world under the brands of Exxon, Mobil, and Esso. It also owns hundreds of smaller subsidiaries such as Imperial Oil Limited (69.6% ownership), an oil retailer in Canada, and SeaRiver Maritime, a petroleum shipping company. The upstream division dominates the company's cashflow, accounting for approximately 70% of revenue. The company employs over 82,000 people worldwide, as indicated in ExxonMobil's 2006 Corporate Citizen Report, with approximately 4,000 employees in its Fairfax downstream headquarters and 27,000 people in its Houston upstream headquarters. [1] Operating divisionsExxonMobil is organized functionally into a number of global operating divisions. These divisions are grouped into three categories for reference purposes, though the company also has several ancillary divisions, such as Coal & Minerals, which are stand alone.
Operating divisions by category are as follows:
HistoryThe Exxon Mobil Corporation was formed in 1999 by the merger of two major oil companies, Exxon and Mobil. Both Exxon and Mobil were descendants of the John D. Rockefeller corporation, Standard Oil which was established in 1870. The reputation of Standard Oil in the public eye suffered badly after publication of Ida M. Tarbell's classic exposé The History of the Standard Oil Company in 1904, leading to a growing outcry for the government to take action against the company. By 1911, with public outcry at a climax, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that Standard Oil must be dissolved and split into 34 companies. Two of these companies were Jersey Standard ("Standard Oil Company of New Jersey"), which eventually became Exxon, and Socony ("Standard Oil Company of New York"), which eventually became Mobil. In the same year, the nation's kerosene output was eclipsed for the first time by gasoline. The growing automotive market inspired the product trademark Mobiloil, registered by Socony in 1920. Over the next few decades, both companies grew significantly. Jersey Standard, led by Walter C. Teagle, became the largest oil producer in the world. It acquired a 50 percent share in Humble Oil & Refining Co., a Texas oil producer. Socony purchased a 45 percent interest in Magnolia Petroleum Co., a major refiner, marketer and pipeline transporter. In 1931, Socony merged with Vacuum Oil Co., an industry pioneer dating back to 1866 and a growing Standard Oil spin-off in its own right. In the Asia-Pacific region, Jersey Standard had oil production and refineries in Indonesia but no marketing network. Socony-Vacuum had Asian marketing outlets supplied remotely from California. In 1933, Jersey Standard and Socony-Vacuum merged their interests in the region into a 50-50 joint venture. Standard-Vacuum Oil Co., or "Stanvac," operated in 50 countries, from East Africa to New Zealand, before it was dissolved in 1962. Mobil Chemical Company was established in 1960. As of 1999, its principal products included basic olefins and aromatics, ethylene glycol and polyethylene. The company produced synthetic lubricant base stocks as well as lubricant additives, propylene packaging films and catalysts. Exxon Chemical Company (first named Enjay Chemicals) became a worldwide organization in 1965 and in 1999 was a major producer and marketer of olefins, aromatics, polyethylene and polypropylene along with specialty lines such as elastomers, plasticizers, solvents, process fluids, oxo alcohols and adhesive resins. The company was an industry leader in metallocene catalyst technology to make unique polymers with improved performance. In 1955, Socony-Vacuum became Socony Mobil Oil Co. and in 1966 simply Mobil Oil Corp. A decade later, the newly incorporated Mobil Corporation absorbed Mobil Oil as a wholly owned subsidiary. Jersey Standard changed its name to Exxon Corporation in 1972 and established Exxon as a trademark throughout the United States. In other parts of the world, Exxon and its affiliated companies continued to use its Esso trademark. On March 24, 1989, the Exxon Valdez oil tanker struck Bligh Reef in Prince William Sound, Alaska and spilled more than 11 million gallons (42,000 m³) of crude oil. The Exxon Valdez oil spill was the second largest in U.S. history, and in the aftermath of the Exxon Valdez incident, the U.S. Congress passed the Oil Pollution Act of 1990. The company is still appealing a $2.5 billion USD punitive ruling, and has not paid any damages yet. In 1998, Exxon and Mobil signed a US$73.7 billion definitive agreement to merge and form a new company called ExxonMobil Corporation, the largest company on the planet. After shareholder and regulatory approvals, the merger was completed on November 30, 1999. The merger of Exxon and Mobil was unique in American history because it reunited the two largest companies of John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil trust, Standard Oil Company of New Jersey/Exxon and Standard Oil Company of New York/Mobil, which had been forcibly separated by government order nearly a century earlier. As a result of the merger, it became largest merger in US corporate history. In 2000, ExxonMobil sold a refinery in Benicia, California and 340 Exxon-branded stations to Valero Energy Corporation, as part of an FTC-mandated divestiture of California assets. ExxonMobil continues to supply petroleum products to over 700 Mobil-branded retail outlets in California. In 2005, ExxonMobil's stock price surged in parallel with rising oil prices, surpassing General Electric as the largest corporation in the world in terms of market capitalization. At the end of 2005, it reported record profits of US $36 billion in annual income, up 42% from the previous year (the overall annual income was an all-time record for annual income by any business, and included $10 billion in the third quarter alone, also an all-time record income for a single quarter by any business). The company and the American Petroleum Institute, the oil and chemical industry's lobbying apparatus, tried to downplay its success in order to avoid consumer criticism by putting up page-long ads in major American newspapers, such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, comparing oil industry profits to those of other large industries such as pharmaceuticals and banking. [10] [11] CriticismForeign business practicesInvestigative reporting by Forbes Magazine raised questions about ExxonMobil's dealings with the leaders of oil-rich nations." ExxonMobil controls concessions covering 11 million acres (44,500 km²) off the coast of Angola that hold an estimated 7.5 billion barrels (1.2 km³) of crude.[4] Forbes alleged that "ExxonMobil handed hundreds of millions of dollars to the corrupt regime of President José Eduardo dos Santos in the late 1990s.[5][6] [7][8] [9] In 2003, the Office of Foreign Assets Control reported that ExxonMobil engaged in illegal trade with Sudan and it, along with dozens of other companies, settled with the United States government for $50,000.[10] In March 2003, James Giffen of the Mercator Corporation was indicted, accused of bribing President Nursultan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan with $78 million to help ExxonMobil win a 25 percent share of the Tengiz oilfield, the third largest in the world. On April 2, 2003, former-Mobil executive J. Bryan Williams was indicted on tax charges relating to this same transaction. The case is the largest under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.[11] This series of events is depicted in the film Syriana. In a U.S. Department of Justice release dated September 18, 2003, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York announced that J. Bryan Williams, a former senior executive of Mobil Oil Corporation, had been sentenced to three years and ten months in prison on charges of evading income taxes on more than $7 million in unreported income, "including a $2 million kickback he received in connection with Mobil's oil business in Kazakhstan." According to documents filed with the court, Williams' unreported income included millions of dollars in kickbacks from governments, persons, and other entities with whom Williams conducted business while employed by Mobil. In addition to his sentence, Williams must pay a fine of $25,000 and more than $3.5 million in restitution to the IRS, in addition to penalties and interest.[12] Human rightsExxonMobil is the target of human rights activists for actions taken by the corporation in the Indonesian territory of Aceh. In June 2001 a lawsuit against ExxonMobil was filed in the Federal District Court of the District of Columbia under the Alien Tort Claims Act. The suit alleges that the ExxonMobil knowingly assisted human rights violations, including torture, murder and rape, by employing and providing material support to Indonesian military forces, who committed the alleged offenses during civil unrest in Aceh. Human rights complaints involving ExxonMobil's relationship with the Indonesian military first arose in 1992; the company denies these accusations and has filed a motion to dismiss the suit, which as of 2006 is still pending.[12] The company does not provide domestic partnership benefits to same-sex couples, although former Mobil employees receive that benefit.[13] According to a proxy statement from ExxonMobil, the company "has zero tolerance discrimination and harassment policies" on "discrimination and harassment for any reason, including sexual orientation."[14] ExxonMobil scored a 0 out of 100 on the Corporate Equality Index 2006 for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people.[15] EnvironmentExxonMobil's environmental record has been a consistent target of critics, not only from outside organizations like GreenPeace but also from institutional investors unhappy about its stance on global warming.[16] Based on year 2000 data,[17] ExxonMobil was ranked sixth on the Toxic 100 list of US corporate air polluters by Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) [18] Exxon's Brooklyn Oil SpillNew York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced on July 17, 2007 that he had filed suit against the ExxonMobil Corporation and ExxonMobil Refining and Supply Company to force cleanup of the oil spill at Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and to restore Newtown Creek.[19] A study of the spill released by the US Environmental Protection Agency in September 2007 reported that the spill consists of approximately 17 to 30 million gallons of petroleum products.[20] By comparison, the Exxon Valdez oil spill was approximately 11 million gallons.[21] The study reported that in the early 1900s Standard Oil of New York operated a major refinery in the area where the spill is located. The refinery produced fuel oils, gasoline, kerosene and solvents. Naptha and gas oil, secondary products, were also stored in the refinery area. Standard Oil of New York later became Mobil, the predecessor to Exxon/Mobil.[22] Exxon Valdez oil spillThe March 24, 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill resulted in the discharge of approximately 11 million gallons of oil (240,000 barrels) into Prince William Sound.[21], oiling 1300 miles of the remote Alaskan coastline. The State of Alaska's Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council stated that the spill "is widely considered the number one spill worldwide in terms of damage to the environment",[21] but many larger spills have occurred. Exxon was widely criticized for its slow response to cleaning up the disaster. John Devens, the Mayor of Valdez, has said his community felt betrayed by Exxon's inadequate response to the crisis.[23] Exxon later removed the name "Exxon" from its tanker shipping subsidiary, which it renamed "SeaRiver Maritime." The renamed subsidiary, though wholly Exxon-controlled, has a separate corporate charter and board of directors, and the former Exxon Valdez is now the SeaRiver Mediterranean. The renamed tanker is legally owned by a small, stand-alone company, which would have minimal ability to pay out on claims in the event of a further accident.[24] ExxonMobil has yet to pay any of the $2.5 billion USD in punitive damages owed to 33,000 fishermen, businesses, and affected communities as a result of the spill.[25] Exxon had argued that it should pay no more than $25 million in punitive damages in the case, and the case is currently on appeal to the United States Supreme Court.[25] Funding of global warming skepticsExxonMobil has drawn criticism as a major funder of organizations campaigning against the scientific opinion that global warming is caused by the burning of fossil fuels, and against the Kyoto Protocol. According to Mother Jones Magazine, the company was a leading member of one of the first such skeptic groups, the Global Climate Coalition, founded in 1989.[26] According to The Guardian, ExxonMobil has funded, among other groups skeptical of global warming, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, George C. Marshall Institute, Heartland Institute, Congress on Racial Equality, TechCentralStation.com, and International Policy Network.[27][28] ExxonMobil's support for these organizations has drawn condemnation from the Royal Society, the academy of sciences of the United Kingdom.[29] The Union of Concerned Scientists released a report in 2007 accusing ExxonMobil of spending $16 million, between 1998 and 2005, towards 43 advocacy organizations which dispute the impact of global warming.[30] The report argued that ExxonMobil used disinformation tactics similar to those used by the tobacco industry in its denials of the link between lung cancer and smoking, saying that the company used "many of the same organizations and personnel to cloud the scientific understanding of climate change and delay action on the issue."[30] These charges are consistent with a purported 1998 internal ExxonMobil strategy memo, posted by the environmental group Environmental Defense, stating
In August 2006, the Wall Street Journal revealed that a YouTube video lampooning Al Gore, titled Al Gore's Penguin Army, appeared to be astroturfing by DCI Group, a Washington PR firm with ties to ExxonMobil as well as the Republican Party.[32][33] In January 2007, the company appeared to change its position, when vice president for public affairs Kenneth Cohen said "we know enough now — or, society knows enough now — that the risk is serious and action should be taken." Cohen stated that, as of 2006, ExxonMobil had ceased funding of the Competitive Enterprise Institute and "'five or six' similar groups".[34] While the company did not publicly state which the other similar groups were, a May 2007 report by Greenpeace does list the five groups it stopped funding as well as a list of 41 other climate skeptic groups which are still receiving ExxonMobil funds.[35] On February 13, 2007, ExxonMobil CEO Rex W. Tillerson acknowledged that the planet was warming while carbon dioxide levels were increasing, but in the same speech gave an unalloyed defense of the oil industry and predicted that hydrocarbons would dominate the world’s transportation as energy demand grows by an expected 40 percent by 2030. Tillerson stated that there is no significant alternative to oil in coming decades, and that ExxonMobil would continue to make petroleum and natural gas its primary products,[36] saying: "I'm no expert on biofuels. I don't know much about farming and I don't know much about moonshine. ... There is really nothing ExxonMobil can bring to that whole biofuels issue. We don't see a direct role for ourselves with today's technology."[37] Corporate AffairsThe current Chairman of the Board and CEO of Exxon Mobil Corporation is Rex Tillerson. Tillerson assumed the top position on January 1, 2006, on the retirement of long-time chairman and CEO, Lee Raymond, who received a retirement and severance package of approximately $400 million USD, of which some were critical. Board of directorsAs of January 29, 2007, the current Exxon Mobil board members are: [38]
Joint Ventures and Other Strategic Alliances
Revenue and profitsIn 2005, ExxonMobil surpassed Wal-Mart as the world's largest publicly held corporation when measured by revenue, although Wal-Mart remained the largest by number of employees.[39]ExxonMobil's $340 billion revenues in 2005 were a 25.5 percent increase over their 2004 revenues. In 2006, Wal-Mart recaptured the lead with revenues of $348.7 billion against ExxonMobil's $335.1. ExxonMobil continues to lead the world in both profits ($39.5 billion in 2006), and market value ($410.7 billion).[40] Its profit margin of 10.5% in 2006 is not among the top among publicly traded companies. Financial data
Largest shareholdersAs of March 30, 2007:[13]
References
General information
Funding given by ExxonMobil
Websites critical of ExxonMobil
ExxonMobil responses to issues
Bibliography
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