EXCLUSIVE-Occidental's Hollub, US oil's most powerful woman, prepares to hand over reins, sources say
By David French and Shariq Khan
HOUSTON/NEW YORK, March 26 (Reuters) - Vicki Hollub is preparing to retire as chief executive of Occidental Petroleum OXY.N, after her decade-long stewardship of the U.S. oil and gas company that made her one of the most powerful women in a male-dominated industry, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.
Hollub, 66, plans to make a formal announcement later this year, according to four people with knowledge of the matter. Richard Jackson, who was elevated to chief operating officer in October, is primed to become CEO upon Hollub's departure, three of the people added.
Her exit would end more than four decades at the Houston-based oil producer, where she became the first woman to become the CEO of a major U.S. oil company. Prior to that, she led Oxy's Permian Basin operations, building the company into one of the biggest operators in the nation's largest U.S. oil region.
Her tenure has been marked by the mammoth, debt-fueled 2019 acquisition of rival Anadarko Petroleum, completed in part with $10 billion in financing from Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway.
There is no firm date set for her retirement, the sources said, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations. The ongoing conflict in the Middle East, which has delivered the biggest disruption to energy supplies in history, could reshape her plans, they added.
“We have a strong board with strong governance, and we do not comment on speculation,” an Oxy spokesperson said in an emailed statement.
Oxy shares rose modestly after Reuters reported on the plans, and were up 4% in Thursday trading.
THE ANADARKO DEAL
In 2019, Hollub beat out supermajor Chevron CVX.N in a fierce bidding war for Anadarko that advanced Oxy's shale business when the fracking boom was in full swing.
The $55 billion acquisition left Oxy with tens of billions of dollars of debt which it is still paying down. The $10 billion in financing with Berkshire Hathaway BRKa.N drew investor criticism for its generous terms for the investment giant, particularly after crude prices collapsed a year later due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
It sparked an activist campaign by billionaire investor Carl Icahn, who criticized the size of the deal - calling the Berkshire terms "egregious" - and waged a campaign to replace several Oxy board members. The parties eventually settled by adding three of his associates to the board. Hollub and other executives agreed to pay cuts at that time, in part because of falling oil prices.
Since the deal's closure in August 2019, Oxy shares have gained about 35%, compared with a 122% rise in the broad-market Standard & Poor's 500 index.
MORE FOCUSED
The company she will hand over is more focused on oil and gas production than the one she inherited, partly due to additional moves Hollub made, including the $12 billion purchase of shale producer CrownRock in 2024 and the $9.7 billion divestment of its chemicals business completed at the start of this year.
The expected elevation of 49-year-old Jackson, who joined Oxy in 2003, continues Oxy's trend of promoting insiders with deep knowledge of the company.
A transitional period is expected, the sources said. This could include Hollub remaining in an advisory capacity to the new CEO, or announcing she will step down at a future date, with Jackson named CEO-designate. She is expected to remain on the company's board, they added.
This would echo her own rise in April 2016, when she officially assumed the CEO role almost a year after prior head Stephen Chazen announced his succession plan.
As well as being attuned to Oxy's culture, Jackson's experience in enhanced oil recovery is expected to be vital, as U.S. shale production plateaus and more creative extraction techniques are needed, said another person.
BREAKING DOWN BARRIERS
Hollub, a native of Birmingham, Alabama, has been key in breaking down gender barriers in an industry still dominated by men. She was the sole female chief executive of a publicly listed American oil and gas company for much of her tenure, but women now head a handful of energy producers, refiners and pipeline companies.
This includes Maryann Mannen at Marathon Petroleum MPC.N and Beth McDonald at SM Energy SM.N. Meg O'Neill is set to take over UK-headquartered BP BP.L on April 1, and will be the first woman to head a global supermajor.
Hollub graduated from the University of Alabama in 1981 and joined Cities Service, which was acquired by Occidental in 1982.
Her expertise as a corporate leader is expected to be in demand once she relinquishes the CEO title, and she has already been contacted about possible board opportunities at other companies, said one of the four sources, and another person familiar with those talks.
She has been a board director at Lockheed Martin LMT.N since 2018, according to its website.
