Business

ExxonMobil
ExxonMobil is an American multinational petroleum (oil) corporation. It is a direct descendant of
the Standard Oil Company founded by John D Rockefeller. It was formed on 30 November 1999,
by the merger of Exxon and Mobil. Its headquarters are in Texas in the USA. It is affiliated with
Imperial Oil, which operates in Canada.
ExxonMobil is one of the largest publicly traded companies by market capitalisation in the world,
having been ranked either No.1 or No. 2 for the past 5 years. ExxonMobil’s oil reserves were 72
billion oil-equivalent barrels at the end of 2007 which, at the then (2007) rates of production, are
expected to last over 14 years. The corporation has 37 oil refineries in 21 countries constituting
a combined daily refining capacity of 6.3 million barrels. ExxonMobil is the largest refiner of
petroleum in the world.
ExxonMobil is the largest of the six oil super majors with daily production of 3.921 million BOE
(barrels of oil equivalent). In 2008, this was approximately 3% of world production, which is
less than several of the largest state-owned petroleum companies. When ranked by oil and gas
reserves it has the14th largest reserves in the world but with less than 1% of the total reserves.
ExxonMobil operates in three main divisions. These are upstream, downstream and chemicals.
Upstream Encompasses the basic operations of ExxonMobil. These are exploration,
extraction, shipping, and production of oil and gas. Based in Houston, Texas in
the USA.
Downstream Covers the activities concerned with marketing, refining and retail operations.
Based in Fairfax, Virginia in the USA.
Chemicals Involves the production of chemicals from petroleum products for use in
manufacturing industries such as technology and automotive (vehicles).
The division is based in Houston, Texas in the USA.
Table 1
Earnings (Profit) by Operating Division
Millions of US Dollars (US$)
2007 2008 2009 2010 2011
Upstream 26,497 35,402 17,107 24,097...