I don’t think Exxon was in on the COVID-19 spread but they did do an extremely poor job of planning. They had too many investments that were producing no money, overspent on plants they were repairing to divest, and also had too much debt and were riding on credit when the market plummeted due to the oil war between Russia and Saudia Arabia.
The primary reason for this lay-off is Exxon being a “One Trick Pony” and hedging it’s monies in nothing but petroleum manufacturing while also divesting from other forms of energy and manufacturing.
The secondary reason is they hired experienced people (from outside of ExxonMobil, not recruited from college) but due to the ExxonMobil corporate culture they were unable to adjust to the accountability, learning curve, and acceptance of other work place cultures that came with these people.
Lastly, they did a lay-off with only the supervisory input based on the financials of the employees and relationships of the employees amongst other management (in other words, who do they know and who will I piss off?).
Nothing to do with the conspiracy of COVID-19.