By GEOFF HO: Dec 27, 2015
With the price of oil languishing below $40 per barrel Ben van Beurden needs a miracle
With the price of oil languishing below $40 per barrel he requires prices to start rising in order to save his £47billion takeover of BG Group. When Van Beurden announced the deal in April, a number of Shell’s investors had doubts because of the valuations involved. Those doubts have since become full-blown fears, as the oil price has fallen through the floor.
To be fair to Shell, there is merit to the deal. BG will provide it with quality assets and enough free cash flow to reinforce its under-pressure dividend. It has also identified billions of cost savings. However, the takeover is predicated on the oil price being at $60 to $70 a barrel and the slump has completely changed the economics of the BG deal.
Oil prices will not stay this low forever, after all it is a finite resource. But with the US and other countries moving to increase production, rather than capitulate in the face of OPEC’s efforts to price them out of the market, I doubt that it will recover enough in 2016 to make the BG deal economically viable.
The Shell chief has staked his personal authority on the deal going through, but I think abandoning it and taking the flak might be the smarter move. Van Beurden should remember it is a lot harder to recover from a bad deal than it is from doing no deal. Merry Christmas and have a happy new year.
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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.
