New BP Chair to Review Business

BP Plc said its new chairman will conduct a review of the entire portfolio and the company will seek to cut costs beyond current targets as it works to reverse years of poor performance.

The London-based oil major is under growing pressure to deliver on a turnaround plan, including from activist investor Elliott Investment Management, which amassed a stake earlier this year to force sweeping changes and has pushed for deeper cost cuts. A strategic reset outlined by the company in February received a lukewarm response from investors.

BP announced the new review Tuesday as it reported second-quarter earnings that topped analyst estimates and a $900 million reduction in structural costs in the first half. The company said it’s completed or announced at least $3 billion of divestments this year as it works to reduce debt and refocus on its core oil and gas business after a failed net-zero strategy.

Chief Executive Officer Murray Auchincloss’s corporate reset in February included targets for reducing costs and capital spending and $20 billion of asset sales by the end of 2027. The CEO said Tuesday the company is initiating a further cost review.

“We want to drive cost efficiency as much as we possibly can,” Auchincloss said in a Bloomberg Television interview. “We’ve had a good start, but we’re two quarters into 12; a lot more to do.”

Separately, incoming Chairman Albert Manifold “will conduct a thorough review of our portfolio of businesses to ensure we are maximizing shareholder value moving forward – allocating capital effectively,” Auchincloss said in a statement. “BP can and will do better for its investors.”

The company posted second-quarter adjusted net income of $2.35 billion, exceeding the average analyst estimate of $1.76 billion. The shares climbed 1.5 percent as of 8:50 a.m. in London, extending their gain since early April to more than 20 percent, outstripping UK rival Shell Plc.

Shareholder Returns

Net debt dropped by about $1 billion to $26 billion at the end of June. The company maintained quarterly share buybacks at $750 million, while the dividend was raised by 4 percent.

What Bloomberg Intelligence Says

“BP still has some way to go to allay investor criticism, but 2Q results show a de-risking of its near-term prospects and distributions” – Will Hares, BI global energy analyst

Manifold, previously CEO of building-materials company CRH Plc, officially starts Sept. 1, and incumbent Chairman Helge Lund will depart a month later. Elliott has called on Manifold to make urgent improvements to the firm’s cost base and capital allocation, saying the turnaround plan is too weak.

Divestments are viewed as a key element of the overhaul. BP has made progress on a series of small disposals, and said it still expects to raise as much as $4 billion this year. However, it’s yet to offload lubricants unit Castrol, which underpins the asset-sale plan.

Asking what the new review will mean for the potential Castrol divestment, RBC Europe analyst Biraj Borkhataria said it may be deferred to allow for the new chairman to take a closer look at capital allocation.

Brazil Discovery

BP has announced a flurry of oil and gas project startups and discoveries around the world as it seeks to show upstream growth. On Monday, the company said it made its largest find in a quarter-century in waters off Brazil, and had brought a Gulf of Mexico oil expansion project online.

BP is the last of the five Big Oil majors to report earnings, with Shell, Exxon Mobil Corp. and Chevron Corp. all exceeding expectations, while TotalEnergies SE missed estimates. On Tuesday, Saudi Aramco reported a decline in profit for a 10th straight quarter as lower oil prices outweighed the impact of higher production.

The period was marked by oil-market volatility, with prices buffeted by US President Donald Trump’s trade war, shifting OPEC+ policy and Israel’s attacks on Iran. Brent slid about 9 percent in the quarter and is now hovering just below $70 a barrel – the level BP uses to model financial targets.

BP has been the subject of mounting takeover speculation over the past year as its shares underperformed. Shell said in June it had no intention of making an offer for the company.