Exxon Defends Dividend After First Annual Loss in Decades
Bloomberg 2/2/2021 Kevin Crowley and Javier Blas
(Bloomberg) Exxon Mobil Corp. pledged to safeguard the S&P 500 Index’s third-largest dividend after posting its first annual loss in at least 40 years, a show of defiance by an oil driller besieged by activist investors and climate-change campaigners.
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Exxon assured investors of its financial health in a world of $50-a-barrel oil and promised that if crude were to dip to $45 it would sacrifice spending in the name of dividends. The Western world’s largest oil explorer has increased the payout each year since 1972, unlike rivals Royal Dutch Shell Plc and BP Plc that cut distributions last year.
(Bloomberg) Exxon Mobil Corp. kept the S&P 500 Index’s third-largest dividend after this year’s rally in commodity prices eased analysts’ fears that the payout was becoming unaffordable.Exxon’s first-quarter dividend will be 87 cents a share, the same level as the previous seven payouts, the Irving, Texas-based company said in a statement on Wednesday. The decision means Exxon, for now, remains one of corporate America’s “dividend aristocrats,” defined as companies that have increased the shareholder distribution consistently for 25 years or more.The oil giant’s precipitous 41% drop last year, the worst annual performance in at least four decades, led some analysts to speculate that the payout was becoming too expensive. Exxon’s cash flow has been too small to cover its dividend and capital spending for the past eight quarters, leading to a dramatic increase in debt.Executives have vowed to defend the payout and redu
Exxon Mobil Corp. slumped after a newspaper report said the company is being investigated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for allegedly overvaluing a key asset in the Permian Basin.
ExxonMobil told a judge that a fraud lawsuit filed by Massachusetts last year amounts to illegal punishment for the energy giant s views about fossil fuels.
(Bloomberg) Exxon Mobil Corp. told a judge that a fraud lawsuit filed by Massachusetts last year amounts to illegal punishment for the energy giant’s views about fossil fuels, the latest twist in their bitter clash over climate change.
The suit by Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey should be dismissed because it violates a state law prohibiting litigation that has the effect of punishing a defendant for statements on public policy matters, Exxon said in a July motion made public Wednesday in state court in Boston.