Published: February 28 2008 02:00 | Last updated: February 28 2008 02:00
As BP’s strategy presentation entered its fourth hour yesterday, weary attenders could have been forgiven for letting their minds drift, perhaps back to a similar event five years earlier. Lord Browne, then chief executive, indicated total production would swell by 1m barrels to 4.5m barrels a day by the end of 2007. As it turned out, BP managed less than half that rise.
That is the company’s problem in a nutshell. Back in February 2003 oil industry valuations were clearly stratified – at the top, on a forward price/earnings ratio about 30 per cent better than the FTSE Eurofirst 300, sat BP, flanked by Shell. In the intervening period, following regular production disappointments, the market has fallen out of love with size. For most of the past year, both BP and Shell have traded in a 10 per cent band beneath that benchmark.
After 10 months at the helm, Tony Hayward, the new chief executive, has set some sensible goals, such as stripping out some of the 11 layers of management between the C-suite and the drill-bit, and increasing exposure to unconventional fuels such as oil sands and liquefied natural gas. BP will also boost its capital spending this year by about 9 per cent to $21.5bn (2003 forecast: $9bn), while scaling down a share buyback programme that had trimmed the company’s equity base by 15 per cent since 2001, without any noticeable effect on the share price.
But Mr Hayward cannot get away from the fact that, thanks to its weighting to mature oil basins, BP has one of the weakest production growth profiles in the industry over the next few years. By Goldman Sachs’ estimates, it will also face the biggest hit from profit declines as a result of higher oil prices under contracts with host governments.
The more modest production target of 4.3m barrels a day by 2012 may be achievable. But given the broken promises, investors will be wary.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008
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Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
