New York Times: Shell to buy back $2 billion in stock
By HEATHER TIMMONS
April 30, 2004
LONDON — The Royal Dutch/Shell Group said on Thursday that it would buy back $2 billion of its shares this year, the latest sign that the company is trying to placate shareholders after months of criticism.
Shell has been under fire since it unexpectedly cut its proven reserves estimates by 20 percent in January and is being investigated by regulators including the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Department of Justice and Britain’s market regulator, the Financial Services Authority.
Thursday’s announcement came as the company reported a 16 percent drop in net income for the first quarter, to $4.43 billion. If a gain for asset sales is subtracted from last year’s first-quarter earnings and adjustments are made for the cost of supplies, Shell’s net income rose 9 percent this quarter.
The company said it would increase capital expenditures this year by $700 million to search for new oil and gas deposits.
Shell has made some significant changes in recent months, including asking its top two executives and its chief financial officer to leave. But just six weeks ago, as it announced more reserves cuts, Shell executives insisted buybacks were not on the agenda, even though shareholders and analysts wanted them.
Shell’s new chairman, Jeroen van der Veer, said in mid-March that buybacks were “priority No. 4,” behind dividends, investments and acquisitions.
Van der Veer acknowledged the change in direction in a telephone interview Thursday. “We have always felt buybacks were not our top priority,” he said.
But the first-quarter results showed strong cash flow, and oil price forecasts are positive, he said.
“You have to look at the shareholders,” he added, and balance their desires against financial management and allocation of capital for business opportunities.
This website and sisters royaldutchshellplc.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, and shellnews.net, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.
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.
