Royal Dutch Shell has taken Exxon Mobil’s cashflow crown, a year after completing the biggest deal in its history.
Europe’s largest energy company vaulted ahead on this closely watched indicator of financial health in the first nine months of 2017 as assets acquired from BG Group from Brazil to Australia churned out cash. For the year as a whole, Shell is on course to surpass its larger US rival on the measure for the first time in about two decades.
Shell generated $28.38 billion (€24.34bn) of cashflow from operations in the first nine months of the year, compared with $23.52 billion (€20.18bn) from Exxon. Chief executive Ben Van Beurden has already spelled out that his main long-term goal was overtaking Exxon to become the best-performing oil major.