Shareholders are not going to put any time and effort into saving the company. They just sell their shares and move on to something else. Shareholders generally have no loyalty to a company, except to make a profit. Unless the Board has someone on it that knows the oil business and the company then they just follow the advice of the CEO. If the CEO creates a narative that the company is in financial trouble due to low oil prices and needs to be sold, then the Board approves the sell and management walks away with a golden parachute. That is a lot better than having to live with the poor acquisition decision that was made.
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Really an awful outcome
@2c9 - spot on.
Should have been a class action by the shareholders. Selling price was a joke. The execs didn’t care and painted a doomsday situation for the board. Shame on the board for being swayed and approving - not a spine or half a brain in the room. What a waste.
Management paid way too much for the Permian acquisition. Rather than admit they overpaid for a major acquisition which would require reserve write downs, they sold the company and pocketed the windfall. The fact that the oil price made a dramatic drop caused the Noble acquisition to be especially lucrative for Chevron. Essentially they bought high and sold low. Not a good way to do business. The sales price for Noble did not matter to the executives since they received millions as a bribe (a perfectly legal one) to sell the company. The execs just needed the board to approve it and then they got their payday. Noble could have survived if the board had done their job.