On Wednesday, Occidental Petroleum, a producer of oil and natural gas, announced the appointment of veteran Sunil Mathew as its new Chief Financial Officer (CFO). Occidental Petroleum frequently changes its financial chiefs, although the company has not specified the reasons for changing its CFO in recent filings with regulatory bodies.
Founded in 1920, Occidental Petroleum is an integrated oil monopoly with core operations in oil and gas exploration and development, chemicals, natural gas transportation, coal, and agriculture.
Occidental Petroleum is one of the energy sector publicly traded companies favored by "Oracle of Omaha" Warren Buffett. Although the company repurchased $522 million worth of preferred shares from Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway in the second quarter, the latest data shows Berkshire still holds $8.8 billion in Occidental's preferred shares and 25% of its common stock, maintaining its position as the company's largest shareholder.
The decision to replace the CFO takes immediate effect, with the former CFO Rob Peterson becoming Executive Vice President of OxyChem, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Occidental Petroleum.
In 2020, facing a massive debt of 40 billion dollars due to the acquisition of competitor Anadarko Petroleum, Occidental Petroleum appointed Peterson as CFO to mitigate the negative criticism brought about by the acquisition.
Peterson's predecessor, Cedric Burgher, who had worked at Anadarko for three years, left his position following a defeat in a dispute over the Anadarko transaction with activist investor and Wall Street "Wolf" Carl Icahn, as Icahn's partners gained three seats on Occidental's board.
The newly appointed CFO Sunil Mathew has been working at Occidental Petroleum since 2004 and served as the company's Vice President responsible for strategic planning and analysis before becoming CFO. Company documents reveal that Mathew played a crucial role in the approximately 10 billion dollars massive asset divestiture plan announced following the acquisition of Anadarko.
Last week, Occidental Petroleum raised its full-year production outlook by 1%, however, due to the decline in oil and gas prices, the company not only failed to meet its profit expectations for the second quarter but also wrote down assets and exited some of its operations.
In terms of stock price, the company was the best performer in the S&P 500 index last year, but so far this year it has lagged behind the market, with its share price only rising by 1% since the beginning of the year, compared to the S&P 500 index's increase of 16.3%.
