Integrated Oil & Gas

ExxonMobil expects the share of production from its advantaged assets, including the Permian Basin, Guyana and LNG, to keep growing, reaching roughly 65% of upstream production under its 2030 plan, up from 59% in the 2026 year-to-date period. The company had previously cautioned that its Middle East production would be affected if the Strait of Hormuz remains closed for a full quarter, but its longer-term production outlook remains bright, with West Texas Intermediate hovering close to the $100 per barrel mark amid continued shipping disruptions through the Strait of Hormuz. On refining, management said in its latest earnings call that it expects elevated refining margins to persist, as market tightness is projected to take time to normalize even after conflicts end, and ExxonMobil intends to maximize throughput across its refining system to capture stronger margins. Refining markets have tightened further since the start of the conflict in the Middle East due to damage to refining infrastructure there, attacks on Russian refining facilities and lower Chinese exports. Shares of ExxonMobil have gained 47.4% over the past year compared with the industry's growth of 49.3%, and the stock trades at a trailing 12-month enterprise value to EBITDA of 9.11X, above the broader industry average of 5.87X.

Chevron has secured updated agreements in Venezuela, committing over US$7.0b to expand its Orinoco Belt footprint as global oil market buffers tighten and geopolitical risks keep crude prices elevated. The company's share price has climbed 21.85% over the past 90 days and 35.71% year to date, contributing to a 1-year total shareholder return of 38.45%. Chevron closed at $211.57, while the most followed narrative pegs fair value at $221.21 using a 7.24% discount rate, implying the stock is 4.4% undervalued. Record production growth, especially in the Permian and from the Hess acquisition in Guyana and the Bakken, positions Chevron to meet rising energy demand. Still, heavy dependence on long-lived oil projects and execution risk in places like Venezuela could quickly undermine the current undervaluation story.

Mr. Bandit Thammaprachit, Chief Operating Officer of the Upstream Petroleum and Natural Gas Business Group at PTT Public Company Limited, or PTT, disclosed that amid the energy transition, natural gas continues to play an important role both as a transition fuel and a destination fuel, especially in Asia, where energy demand is still trending upward, driven by the power sector, the industrial sector, and new sources of demand such as data centers and AI. He also noted that LNG procurement models are shifting from a point-to-point LNG system to a connected flexible network that links supply sources, shipping routes, infrastructure, and destination markets together. PTT therefore places importance on developing both gas and LNG infrastructure and its LNG portfolio in parallel, with two key approaches: first, developing infrastructure to be more connected and flexible, moving from having capacity to having connectivity and flexibility through enhanced storage, reload, re-export, break-bulk, and ship-to-ship capabilities, as well as a virtual inventory approach; and second, building a diversified and flexible LNG portfolio by spreading diversity across supply sources, regions, sellers, contract types, transportation, and destination markets, while balancing long-term contracts that serve as the foundation of supply security with short-term and spot market procurement. Through the development of connected infrastructure alongside a flexible LNG portfolio, PTT aims to elevate Thailand's potential to become the region's physical LNG delivery hub, in order to strengthen the security and flexibility of the Thai energy system.

TotalEnergies has entered into a partnership agreement with Global Infrastructure Partners, a part of BlackRock, covering its interests in some oil and gas infrastructure assets in Africa. Under the deal, GIP will make a US$1.8 billion capital contribution, and TotalEnergies will pay GIP a throughput-based tariff over a period of up to 15 years. Chief Financial Officer Jean-Pierre Sbraire said the agreement strengthens the company's relationship with GIP and crystallizes the value of some of its midstream infrastructure assets in Africa. TotalEnergies is a global integrated energy company with more than 100,000 employees active in about 120 countries.

PTT Group co-hosted the global energy conference and exhibition Gastech 2026, hosted in Thailand, with PTT Group executives taking the stage to present their vision covering natural gas and LNG, energy security, and sustainability. Dr. Kongkrapan Intarajang, Chief Executive Officer and President of PTT Public Company Limited, or PTT, said in a panel discussion titled "LNG in the age of electrification" that the energy transition must balance energy security, affordable prices for the public, and sustainability, with natural gas and LNG regarded as destination fuels that will play a role in the long-term energy system, serving demand from the industrial sector, rising electricity use, as well as AI and data centers. Mr. Bandit Thammaprasitjit, Chief Operating Officer of the Upstream Petroleum and Gas Business Group at PTT, said that PTT aims to develop natural gas and LNG infrastructure from LNG receiving, storage, and regasification to gas pipeline systems and connections with downstream markets, while building a diversified and flexible LNG portfolio and seeking to extend Thailand's potential to become the region's physical LNG delivery hub. Meanwhile, Mr. Jaturong Worawitsurawatthana, Senior Executive Vice President of the International Trading Business Unit at PTT, noted that energy security does not depend solely on the volume of LNG supply, but also on buyers' ability to access LNG at appropriate price levels, and that long-term contracts should be more flexible in terms of volume, delivery schedules, destinations, and price structures. Mr. Rattakorn Kampanatsanyakorn, Senior Executive Vice President of Corporate Sustainability at PTT, disclosed that PTT is developing I-SPARK in the Map Ta Phut area of Rayong Province, which is expected to attract more than 5 billion US dollars in investment, generate more than 3 billion US dollars in economic value, create more than 13,000 new jobs, and help reduce carbon dioxide emissions by approximately 9 million tons per year by 2035, supporting the goal of net zero emissions by 2050.

ExxonMobil has entered preliminary talks with Venezuelan authorities about a potential re-entry into the country's oil sector, while also taking part in newly announced US Vietnam trade agreements that include energy cooperation with Vietnamese partners. Management is assessing Venezuela alongside wider Latin American options as it weighs long-term upstream opportunities in the region. The Venezuela discussions would add long-life upstream sources alongside Guyana and the Permian Basin, though they also sharpen exposure to regulatory and contract uncertainty in politically complex regions. The Vietnam agreements extend ExxonMobil's LNG and gas value chain into a growing Asian demand hub, with potential integration with projects such as Golden Pass LNG. The company operates a global oil and gas portfolio spanning exploration and production of crude and natural gas across the US, Canada, and a wide set of international basins.

ExxonMobil is nearing a deal to invest in Venezuelan oil fields in the Orinoco Belt, according to reports from The Wall Street Journal and WTVB, returning to a country it exited after Hugo Chavez's government nationalized foreign oil assets in 2007. The fields under discussion carry geological estimates of more than 50 billion barrels of oil, a figure that describes oil in the reservoir rather than Exxon's booked reserves or production. Separately, Harold Hamm's Continental Resources signed a memorandum of understanding with Venezuela's state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela on September 16, 2026 covering the Ayacucho 2 Block in the Orinoco Belt, an area with an estimated 30 billion barrels of oil reserves, marking the Oklahoma independent's first move into the country. President Trump has said the United States secured a 65 billion barrel agreement with Venezuela, a claim that does not reconcile with either company's disclosures. Exxon shares traded at $162.01 as of 12:10 p.m. ET on September 17, 2026, down 0.80% on the session, but remain up 37.31% year to date and 45.33% over the past year.

ExxonMobil plans to invest roughly $20 billion in lower-emission projects between 2025 and 2030, and management expects newer business segments including carbon capture and storage, lithium, carbon materials, and Proxxima products to generate more than $1 billion in annual earnings by 2030, with roughly $13 billion in potential annual earnings by 2040 assuming supportive policies and sufficient market development. The company already holds contracts covering roughly 9 million metric tons of CO2 annually from industrial customers, and its first commercial carbon capture projects are now operating, which should give management enough commercial activity by 2027 to offer investors better visibility into what carbon capture can contribute financially. The bet is framed against a shifting oil demand picture: more than 20 million electric cars were sold globally in 2025, about one-quarter of all new-car sales, and the International Energy Agency expects EVs to approach 29% of global car sales in 2026, with the existing EV fleet displacing roughly 1.7 million barrels of oil demand per day in 2025 and potentially around 5 million barrels per day by 2030. ExxonMobil is also developing carbon-capture-enabled data center projects that would use natural gas to generate electricity while capturing the resulting emissions. The prediction is that 2027 is when ExxonMobil's low-carbon investments start showing up more clearly in guidance.

Matlantis announced that ENEOS Holdings Corporation is using its Matlantis PFP machine learning potential with NVIDIA ALCHEMI to accelerate the discovery of new catalyst materials. By combining PFP with NVIDIA ALCHEMI, ENEOS HD evaluated approximately 100 million candidate structures for oxygen evolution reaction catalysts, identifying priority candidates for synthesis and experimental validation. The effort reduced a discovery process that traditionally took years to just a few months. PFP is a general-purpose machine learning interatomic potential supporting all 96 chemical elements, while NVIDIA ALCHEMI provides an accelerated computing platform for scaling computational workflows across chemistry and materials science. Takeshi Ibuka, General Manager of the AI Innovation Department at ENEOS Holdings Corporation, said the work demonstrates how large-scale computational screening can fundamentally change the way materials are discovered and developed. Matlantis President and CEO Daisuke Okanohara and Dion Harris, senior director of HPC, Cloud and AI Infrastructure at NVIDIA, also commented on the collaboration.

The PTT Group will co-host Gastech 2026 from September 14 to 17, 2026, at the BITEC Exhibition and Convention Center in Bangkok, where PTT Group executives will share their vision on the global stage on natural gas, LNG, energy security, and sustainability. Dr. Kongkrapan Intarajang, Chief Executive Officer and President of PTT Public Company Limited, or PTT, speaking on the panel titled LNG in the Age of Electrification: Contracting, Competition & Demand Realities, said that energy security and supply stability are key factors in the era of electrification and the growth of AI and data centers, with PTT operating under the Energy Trilemma principle of energy security, accessible and competitive prices, and sustainability. On infrastructure, the PTT Group operates more than 4,500 kilometers of onshore and offshore natural gas pipelines, connected to both of its LNG terminals, while PTT LNG Company Limited, or PTTLNG, has the capacity to receive, store, and regasify up to 19 million tons of LNG per year and maintains readiness at 100 percent. Meanwhile, PTT Exploration and Production Public Company Limited, or PTTEP, is expanding its investments across 10 countries worldwide. Dr. Buranin Rattanasombat, Chief Operating Officer of the New Business and Sustainability Group at PTT Public Company Limited, or PTT, disclosed that PTT has completed its Master Development Plan for CCS and is conducting seismic surveys together with the government sector and Japan's JICA, aiming to develop the first phase of CCS with a capacity of approximately 5 million tons per year by 2035 before expanding to cross-border services in the future.

ExxonMobil is close to signing a preliminary deal to explore investments in several Venezuelan oil fields, The Wall Street Journal reported Wednesday, which would mark a return to the country nearly two decades after its exit. Exxon could sign a memorandum of understanding with state-run PDVSA as soon as this month to explore a deal to invest in a number of developed and undeveloped fields that collectively contain 50B barrels of oil, according to the report. The company reportedly is interested in retaking control of two giant fields it previously held in the Orinoco Belt, Petrovictoria and Petromonagas, before they were nationalized in the mid-2000s, and securing rights to two additional fields in the nearby Carabobo region. Venezuela has said it has ~300B barrels of oil reserves, which would make its reserves the largest in the world. Exxon rival Chevron signed a deal earlier this month to invest $7B in Venezuela over five years through its joint ventures there, aiming to double its production to 600K bbl/day, and Harold Hamm's Continental Resources signed a preliminary deal Wednesday to explore an undeveloped oil field in the state of Anzoátegui.

ExxonMobil Holdings Corporation is in active negotiations to return to Venezuela, according to a report from Bloomberg, as the Texas oil titan weighs a high-stakes return to the nation holding the world's largest crude reserves. Senior executives traveled to Caracas this week to discuss securing rights to four heavy-oil fields, including two Orinoco Belt assets, Petrovictoria and Petromonagas, that were nationalized under former President Hugo Chávez. The talks mark a shift in corporate strategy as Washington pushes American energy firms to revitalize Venezuela's deteriorating energy sector, even though Chief Executive Officer Darren Woods previously characterized the country as uninvestable. Unlike peers that maintained a continuous presence, ExxonMobil faces substantial capital requirements to rebuild infrastructure from scratch after twice having its local assets seized over past decades, but management views its proprietary heavy-oil capabilities, developed in its Canadian oil sands operations, as a key strategic differentiator that could yield structurally low production costs. The momentum reflects a rapidly expanding footprint for U.S. producers under updated policy frameworks from Washington, with peers like Chevron Corp. already targeting aggressive long-term production targets and private players rapidly entering the market.

Chevron announced updated agreements with Venezuela covering its joint ventures, including enhanced fiscal, commercial and legal terms, additional Orinoco Belt acreage, and plans to invest over US$7.00 billion in the next five years to support higher production. A key feature of the deal is the Petroindependencia joint venture securing rights to develop the adjacent Carabobo 1 and Carabobo-2-South-A areas, expanding Chevron's extra-heavy oil footprint alongside prior acreage gains such as Ayacucho 8. The expanded Venezuela commitments reinforce the near term production and cash flow story but also add geopolitical and project execution risk, which remains one of the most important swing factors for the stock. Chevron's push to build a roughly 20 million metric ton per year LNG portfolio, including third party supply, sits alongside the Venezuela news as part of a broader effort to deepen hydrocarbon cash generation. Chevron's narrative projects $199.4 billion revenue and $25.3 billion earnings by 2029, with three Simply Wall St Community fair value estimates for Chevron spanning roughly US$221 to US$349 per share.

Chevron's 20-year take-or-pay power purchase agreement with Microsoft for 2.67 GW of behind-the-meter capacity in West Texas, branded Project Kilby, is designed to deliver mid-teens returns and long duration contracted cash flows independent of commodity price cycles, a structure management calls a repeatable model. The company reported Q2 2026 adjusted EPS of $6.06 on revenue of $67.20 billion, up 51.4% year over year, with downstream earnings jumping to $4.87 billion from $737 million. Management hit $3 billion of structural cost cuts six months early and captured $1.5 billion of Hess synergies, 50% above the initial target, while debt fell $8.41 billion in the quarter alone. Chevron stock is up 46.85% year to date, brushing a 52-week high of $217.65, and trades at a trailing P/E of 20 versus ExxonMobil's 24. The bull case supports $238 within a year, while the bear path lands around $197.48.

Occidental Petroleum posted the largest analyst estimate beat among the five diversified upstream exploration and production stocks tracked, reporting $8.33 billion in revenue, up 57.1% year on year and 15.3% above consensus. As a group, the five diversified upstream E&P stocks beat analysts' consensus revenue estimates by 9.7% in an exceptional second quarter, and their share prices have risen 15.6% on average since the results. ExxonMobil reported $116 billion in revenue, up 42.3% year on year and 6.8% above expectations, while Chevron, the weakest performer against estimates in the group, reported $70.06 billion, up 56.3% and 6.2% ahead of consensus. Devon Energy delivered the fastest revenue growth among its peers at 67.4%, reaching $6.89 billion and topping expectations by 10.3%, and ConocoPhillips reported $19.52 billion, up 32.4% and 9.6% above estimates, the slowest growth in the group. Occidental Petroleum shares are up 17.9% since reporting and trade at $63.45, ExxonMobil is up 7.9% at $169.40, Chevron is up 13.1% at $217.43, Devon Energy is up 16.5% at $51.34, and ConocoPhillips is up 22.8% at $141.27.

TotalEnergies has entered into a three-year partnership with French AI company Mistral to develop AI models for oil and gas reservoir exploration and engineering, backed by an investment of more than €100m. The joint programme aims to improve the ability to integrate, process and interpret large volumes of geoscientific data, combining TotalEnergies' expertise in subsurface geoscience and reservoir engineering with Mistral's technological and scientific resources. The goal is to create AI models that generate multiple development scenarios for exploration opportunities, as well as optimise or extend the life of existing projects. The companies plan to use next-generation AI techniques including agentic AI to work with up to ten petaflops of data, alongside nearly a century of TotalEnergies' accumulated geoscience knowledge, and will set up a shared scientific laboratory bringing together TotalEnergies' subsurface specialists and Mistral's scientific and technical skills. TotalEnergies chairman and CEO Patrick Pouyanné said exploration and reservoir engineering are among the areas where artificial intelligence can create the greatest value, while Mistral co-founder and CEO Arthur Mensch said the project demonstrates the ability of its models to support complex industrial processes. Earlier this month, TotalEnergies completed an asset swap with Galp following an agreement reached in December 2025, acquiring a 40% operated interest in the PEL83 licence, which includes the Mopane discovery, in return for Galp receiving a 10% participating interest in the PEL56 licence, covering the Venus discovery, and a 9.39% participating interest in the PEL91 licence.

ExxonMobil Holdings Corporation said on September 14 that it expects its annual LNG sales to reach 50 million tons by 2030, up from its previous target of 40 million tons, with sales continuing to rise beyond the current decade in line with market growth. The company expects global LNG demand to grow from over 400 million tons today to around 500 million tons by 2030, before doubling by 2050, with Asia accounting for 70% of world demand by 2050. Exxon is investing heavily to expand capacity, and its Golden Pass LNG joint venture with QatarEnergy near the Texas-Louisiana border is expected to reach full production toward the end of 2027, producing 18 million metric tons per annum and ranking among the largest LNG facilities in the world. The raised outlook supports ExxonMobil's targets of $25 billion in earnings growth and $35 billion in cash flow growth by 2030 compared with 2024. Exxon also warned that a prolonged closure of the Strait of Hormuz in the third quarter could reduce its Middle East output by around 750,000 boepd versus last year, after it lost around 450,000 barrels per day of output in the second quarter.

Cenovus Energy closed the most recent trading day at $33.92, up 1.95% from the previous session and ahead of the S&P 500's daily loss of 0.45%. Over the past month the oil company's shares have gained 3.55%, outpacing the Oils-Energy sector's 2% gain and the S&P 500's 1.99% loss. For its upcoming earnings release, analysts expect Cenovus Energy to post earnings of $1.07 per share, a year-over-year increase of 105.77%, on revenue of $11.62 billion, up 21.25% from the same quarter last year. For the full year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates project earnings of $3.57 per share and revenue of $42.35 billion, representing changes of +131.82% and +19.1% respectively from the prior year. The consensus EPS projection has moved 11.34% higher over the past 30 days, and Cenovus Energy currently carries a Zacks Rank of #3 (Hold) with a Forward P/E ratio of 9.33, a discount to its industry's average Forward P/E of 10.56.

BP closed at $46.96, up 2.24% from the previous session, outpacing a 0.45% decline in the S&P 500. The oil and gas company's shares have gained 7.19% over the past month, while the Oils-Energy sector rose 2% and the S&P 500 fell 1.99%. Analysts expect BP to report earnings of $1.7 per share on revenue of $63.9 billion when it discloses results on October 30, 2026, representing year-over-year growth of 100% and 29.76%, respectively. For the full year, the Zacks Consensus Estimates project earnings of $6.58 per share and revenue of $232.88 billion, changes of +128.47% and +20.95% from the preceding year. BP currently carries a Zacks Rank of #1 (Strong Buy), with a Forward P/E ratio of 6.98 and a PEG ratio of 0.54.

Exxon Mobil Holdings (XOM) closed up 2.42% at $169.08, outperforming a session in which the S&P 500 fell 0.45%, the Dow lost 0.63% and the Nasdaq dropped 0.78%. The oil and natural gas company's stock has climbed 2.24% over the past month, beating the Oils-Energy sector's 2% gain and the S&P 500's 1.99% loss. For its upcoming earnings release, the company is expected to report an EPS of $3.78, a 101.06% rise from the year-ago quarter, on revenue of $104.88 billion, up 22.96%. Full-year Zacks Consensus Estimates project earnings of $11.93 per share and revenue of $409.73 billion, representing changes of +70.67% and +23.32%, respectively, from the prior year. Exxon Mobil Holdings currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold), a Forward P/E of 13.84 versus an industry average of 8.9, and a PEG ratio of 1.01 against an industry average of 0.68.

Chevron CEO has warned that a global fuel crisis is already here, as supply fears clash with ongoing demand. The warning from the leadership of Chevron, one of the world's biggest integrated energy producers, comes as major oil producers flag that worldwide fuel markets have entered a tougher stretch. Tighter markets can lift crude prices, refining margins and cash generation for oil producers, a dynamic that could prove significant for Chevron and Exxon Mobil, both of which have spent years prioritizing capital discipline over output expansion at any cost. The flip side is that energy prices rising high enough to hurt consumer spending, raise transportation costs and push inflation higher could complicate interest rate decisions for central banks. For Chevron and Exxon stockholders, the next signal will be whether supply limitations keep crude and refined-product prices high, or whether sluggish economic activity starts to undermine demand.

Chevron outlined plans to expand its liquefied natural gas portfolio across Argentina, the East Mediterranean, Africa, and Australia, as Middle East supply disruptions affect global gas trade flows. Management is aiming to secure more diversified LNG volumes to support long term contracts with buyers in several international markets, spreading its gas exposure across multiple basins instead of relying heavily on the Middle East. The company operates a large integrated energy and chemicals platform, with LNG sitting alongside oil and refining activities that span multiple regions. Chevron currently holds 20 million metric tons per year of LNG capacity, and the expansion would add sanctioned capacity beyond that level. The key markers to watch over the next 12 to 24 months are progress on new LNG offtake agreements, sanctioned capacity additions beyond the current 20 million metric tons per year, and any disclosed capex or schedule revisions.

Chevron CEO Mike Wirth said the emergency oil buffers that softened the market after the Iran conflict began have been largely depleted and cannot be repeated indefinitely, leaving crude vulnerable to fresh disruptions. He is backing that view with a Venezuela expansion aimed at more than doubling output there by early next decade, funded entirely with cash generated by Chevron's existing Venezuelan joint ventures. Output across the three joint ventures has already climbed from 40,000 to 250,000 barrels per day, and Wirth said Chevron is in negotiations to improve fiscal terms and enable more investment in Venezuela, with debt recovery expected to be complete by early 2027. Brent settled at $109.51 on September 9, 2026, well above the $61.35 close on December 31, 2025, while Chevron's Q2 adjusted EPS was $6.06 on revenue of $67.20 billion, up 51.43% year over year, with free cash flow of $18.10 billion and record worldwide production of 4,070 MBOED. CVX trades at $214.04, up 44.35% year to date, on a forward earnings multiple of 16x with a 3.28% dividend yield and a 39th consecutive annual dividend increase.

Occidental Petroleum is drawing heavy investor attention, with the oil and gas exploration and production company's shares returning +4.6% over the past month against a -2% change for the Zacks S&P 500 composite, while the Zacks Oil and Gas - Integrated - United States industry gained 5.4%. Occidental is expected to post earnings of $1.37 per share for the current quarter, a year-over-year change of +114.1%, and the Zacks Consensus Estimate has moved +6.6% over the last 30 days. For the current fiscal year, the consensus earnings estimate of $6.2 points to a change of +180.5% from the prior year, while the next fiscal year's estimate of $4.21 indicates a -32.1% change. Occidental is rated Zacks Rank #3 (Hold), and the consensus sales estimate for the current quarter of $6.69 billion indicates a year-over-year change of -0.5%, with current and next fiscal year estimates of $26.89 billion and $24.78 billion. In the last reported quarter, Occidental posted revenues of $8.33 billion, a year-over-year change of +29%, and EPS of $2.4 versus $0.39 a year ago, beating the Zacks Consensus revenue estimate of $7.18 billion by +16.03% and the EPS estimate by +25%.

Chevron Corporation is looking to expand its global liquefied natural gas portfolio, targeting growth opportunities across Argentina, the East Mediterranean, Australia and Africa while pursuing potential deals with emerging markets such as India. The company expects to have about 20 million metric tons per annum of LNG supply capacity, comprising 16 million tons of net gas production from its projects and another 4 million tons contracted from the U.S. Gulf Coast, with those contracted volumes having begun flowing in February. Chevron recently received approval to become operator and lead gas explorer in an offshore block off Greece, and it is evaluating opportunities in Australia and Africa, though potential projects will need to offer suitable capital, fiscal and regulatory conditions. The company and its partners plan to invest more than $7 billion in Venezuela to more than double oil production by 2031, and Chevron said projects will be assessed and ranked within its broader project queue. In 2024, Chevron signed an agreement with Sembcorp Industries to supply up to 0.6 million tons per annum of LNG from 2028, with Japan remaining a key market and China, South Korea and Singapore also attractive destinations.

TotalEnergies and Mistral announced a three-year joint program representing an investment of more than €100 million to develop a new generation of frontier AI models supporting TotalEnergies' geosciences experts in the exploration, characterization and development of oil and gas reservoirs. The partnership will draw on advances in artificial intelligence, particularly agentic AI, to combine close to 10 petaflops of data with nearly a century of knowledge and expertise accumulated by TotalEnergies in geosciences and reservoir engineering. The two companies will establish a joint scientific laboratory combining TotalEnergies' subsurface know-how with Mistral's scientific and technological capabilities. Patrick Pouyanné, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of TotalEnergies, said exploration and reservoir engineering are among the areas where artificial intelligence can create the greatest value, and that the partnership illustrates the company's commitment to a high-performing European digital ecosystem. Arthur Mensch, Co-founder and CEO of Mistral, said the project demonstrates the ability of Mistral's models to support complex industrial processes and highlights the strength of Europe's industrial ecosystem.

Freeman Shaheen, president of Chevron's global gas division, said the U.S. oil major plans to further expand its natural gas operations around the world. He explained that the aim is to meet demand from buyers concerned about energy security in the wake of the crisis in the Middle East. He spoke in an interview on the sidelines of the Gastech conference in Bangkok. Chevron will have an LNG supply capacity of about 20 million tons a year within a few years, combining 16 million tons from its own projects and 4 million tons from contracts on the U.S. Gulf Coast that began in February this year. Shaheen said, "We want to continue to grow this portfolio," naming Argentina, the Eastern Mediterranean, Australia and Africa as possible target regions. "Japan remains our home base, and Singapore also has opportunities with an excellent structure," he said, adding that China and South Korea also remain attractive markets.

TotalEnergies signed new exploration agreements to operate Angola's offshore Blocks 17/25 and 32/21 in the Lower Congo Basin, expanding its operated footprint in the country. The company also reported rapid first oil from its Acacia-5 discovery, using existing offshore infrastructure to move from find to output quickly. The two Angolan blocks add fresh optionality around future African upstream project volumes, with shared operatorship alongside ExxonMobil and Sonangol. TotalEnergies operates as a large integrated energy producer with a €176.8 billion market cap, spanning oil, biofuels, natural gas, low carbon hydrogen, renewables and electricity across Africa, Europe, the United States and beyond. The expansion deepens the group's dependence on steady project delivery and stable regulation in Africa even as it supports its strategy of redeploying capital into lower-cost, higher-return hydrocarbon projects.

Dr. Kongkrapan Intarajang, Chief Executive Officer and President of PTT Public Company Limited, or PTT, said at Gastech 2026 that energy providers cannot drive the energy transition alone, and must therefore build strategic partnerships and invest in shared regional infrastructure to ensure security and keep Southeast Asia's energy costs at appropriate levels over the long term. Thailand currently draws about 50% of its natural gas from domestic sources and imports roughly 50%, and PTT is focused on managing risk by diversifying fuel supply sources while expanding oil and gas exploration and production in the Gulf of Thailand. At the same time, high electricity use in industry and fast-growing data centre businesses across the region are making the stability of power systems more important. Dr. Kongkrapan noted that Southeast Asia already has cross-border energy links, including thousands of kilometres of cross-border gas pipelines such as the network between Thailand and Malaysia, as well as nearly 20 LNG receiving terminals. But large infrastructure projects require heavy investment and take years to build, and a single operator may not be able to shoulder the cost, so trust must be built among partners, even if they have not cooperated directly under past natural gas or LNG purchase agreements. PTT has raised the flexibility of its refineries so they can switch between Middle Eastern and East Asian crude oil within one week, allowing Thailand to maintain energy continuity and avoid shortages during past crises. Although a flexible energy system costs more, PTT is ready to invest ahead of time and manage the financial burden internally to safeguard energy security and deliver energy to end consumers at the lowest possible cost.

Chevron is expanding its global LNG ambitions as energy security returns to the center of investor attention. The company expects roughly 20 million metric tons per year of LNG supply capacity in 2026, including about 16 million tons from its own projects and another 4 million tons secured through U.S. Gulf Coast contracts. Management is mapping out potential LNG growth across Argentina, the Eastern Mediterranean, Australia and Africa, with India also emerging as a possible future market. Chevron is also seeing a shift in how customers buy gas, with some state-backed importers becoming more willing to work with portfolio suppliers instead of depending primarily on government-to-government arrangements. The shares traded at $214.275, about 32.2% above a GF Value estimate of $162.08, a premium that suggests the market is already pricing in strength from energy prices, cash generation and future LNG growth.

Prime Minister and Interior Minister Anutin Charnvirakul announced at the Gastech Exhibition & Conference 2026 that the government is ready to link energy with investment and expand international cooperation in natural gas and LNG, renewable energy, energy storage systems, carbon management, hydrogen, bioenergy, and clean energy technology, in order to drive Thailand to become the region's hub for energy investment, innovation, and cooperation. He stressed that a balance will be maintained between energy security and prices that the public can afford, and that from mid-October onward the government will begin a 50 billion baht programme to support households in installing solar rooftops. Dr. Kongkrapan Intarajang, Chief Executive Officer and President of PTT Public Company Limited, or PTT, said that hosting Gastech, which draws tens of thousands of participants, is a key opportunity for joint-venture negotiations, finding new energy sources, and expanding LNG trading with partners worldwide. PTT has been in the natural gas business for more than 40 years and believes the world will continue to rely on natural gas as the main fuel for power plants and the industrial sector for another 20 to 30 years. PTT LNG Company Limited, or PTTLNG, has the capacity to receive, store, and regasify up to 19 million tonnes of LNG per year, while PTT plans to expand its LNG portfolio volume to a target of 3.7 million tonnes in 2026 and aims to raise that to 10 million tonnes per year in 2030 and 15 million tonnes per year in 2035. At the same time, PTT has developed Thailand's first CCS project, capable of capturing and reinjecting up to 1 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year, with PTT Exploration and Production announcing a final investment decision in 2025, as well as the Industrial Spark, or I-SPARK, pilot project in Rayong province, and the Total Solution for Industrial Sustainability, which combines IoT, data science, and AI technologies to upgrade energy services for Thailand's industrial sector toward smart energy management.

ExxonMobil raised its long-term liquefied natural gas sales forecast to 50M tons per year by 2030, up from an earlier forecast of 40M tons per year, with volumes expected to keep rising beyond the end of the decade. Senior VP for LNG Peter Clarke told Bloomberg at the Gastech conference in Bangkok that the company expects global LNG demand to grow from more than 400M tons today to roughly 500M tons by 2030, with the U.S. accounting for 30% of the global total, and then to double by 2050, with 70% of world LNG demand by 2050 coming from Asia. Clarke also said Exxon's Golden Pass LNG joint venture with QatarEnergy near the Texas-Louisiana border is expected to reach full production toward the end of 2027, exporting about 18M tons per year. Separately, Exxon said its 264K bbl/day refinery in Joliet, Illinois, was taken offline after a power outage on Sunday; the plant supplies gasoline, diesel and other fuels to the U.S. Midwest and can produce about 11M gal/day.

Chevron is targeting natural gas expansion opportunities across Argentina, the East Mediterranean, Africa and Australia as it seeks to offer customers diversified LNG supply, Freeman Shaheen, President of Global Gas at Chevron, told Reuters on Monday. Shaheen said the energy crisis that trapped LNG supply from Qatar and the United Arab Emirates has reinforced the need for diversity of supply and of contracting structures. Chevron is expanding its footprint in Argentina's Vaca Muerta shale play and building a portfolio of exploration blocks offshore Greece and Cyprus. In Australia, Chevron operates the Gorgon LNG project, which at 15.6 million tons is the largest in the country, and Wheatstone, which can produce 8.9 million tons annually; together the two account for about 5% of global LNG supply. In Africa, Chevron is boosting exploration efforts, and last month announced a new oil and gas condensate discovery offshore Angola, hitting more than 2,000 feet of hydrocarbons in a Block 0 exploration well that could be tied directly into its existing production infrastructure there. Shaheen, speaking on the sidelines of a gas conference in Thailand, did not specify which opportunities Chevron would pursue, but said the company plans to raise its LNG portfolio in the coming years with supply as diverse as Argentina, the Mediterranean and Africa.

TotalEnergies plans to invest $10 billion alongside its partners in Angola over the next five years to maintain and potentially increase its oil production there. The company currently produces around 450,000 barrels per day in Angola, making it the country's largest oil operator and accounting for more than 40% of its total output. The spending will cover existing operations, new exploration, and projects to replace production from Angola's aging offshore fields, including the $6 billion Kaminho development, which is expected to start producing oil in 2028. TotalEnergies has also signed agreements for two additional offshore blocks and recently announced a discovery in Block 17 that could add roughly 6,000 barrels per day. The company acknowledged that much of the $10 billion may be needed just to keep production from falling, and that major projects such as Kaminho will not begin producing until 2028, leaving returns dependent on oil prices and subject to potential delays.

Chevron CEO Mike Wirth said at an energy conference at the University of Texas at Austin on Sept. 11 that depleted global crude oil buffers could push oil prices higher in the coming months, with Brent crude ending the week at $104.61 per barrel and WTI settling at $100.05. Chevron is entering that potential upswing with record production, as second-quarter worldwide production rose 20% year over year to 4.07 million barrels of oil equivalent per day and upstream earnings surged to $8.2 billion from $2.7 billion a year earlier. The company generated $15.4 billion of adjusted free cash flow in the quarter and cut total debt by a record $8.4 billion, and over the past 60 days the Zacks Consensus Estimate for its EPS has risen 18.18% for 2026 and 14.62% for 2027, to $16.51 and $14.66 per share respectively. Chevron shares have gained 36.1% over the past 12 months, trailing ExxonMobil's 47.8% but beating BP's 34.8%, while its P/E of 14.07 is in line with ExxonMobil's 14.04 and well above BP's 8.36. The company has also achieved $1.5 billion of annual run-rate synergies from its Hess integration ahead of schedule, though the main risk is that today's elevated oil prices are heavily influenced by geopolitical disruptions that could reverse if supply normalizes.

PTT Group opened its exhibition at Gastech 2026 at BITEC in Bangkok from September 14 to 17, 2026, with Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul and Energy Minister Ekkanat Promphan attending as witnesses at the opening ceremony. Dr. Kongkrapan Intarajang, Chief Executive Officer and President of PTT Public Company Limited, led the executive team in welcoming guests. PTT is participating as a co-host and is showcasing its energy, technology, and infrastructure capabilities across the entire business chain, while opening a space to connect with partners from around the world. Dr. Kongkrapan said PTT places importance on the country's energy security alongside maintaining business growth under the principle of balance across three dimensions of energy. PTT Group's infrastructure spans from upstream operations, where PTT Exploration and Production, or PTTEP, has investments in 10 countries worldwide, to more than 4,500 kilometers of onshore and offshore natural gas pipelines connected to both LNG terminals. PTT LNG, or PTTLNG, can handle the import, storage, and regasification of up to 19 million tons of LNG per year, and has more than 6 overseas trading offices covering a trade network in over 80 countries. It aims to expand its LNG portfolio volume to 3.7 million tons in 2026, 10 million tons in 2030, and 15 million tons by 2035, in addition to long-term contracts to meet domestic demand totaling 6.2 million tons per year. Meanwhile, Thailand's first CCS project at the Arthit natural gas field can capture and reinject up to 1 million tons of carbon dioxide per year, for which PTTEP announced a final investment decision in 2025.

PTT Group is co-hosting Gastech 2026 from September 14-17, 2026, at the BITEC Exhibition and Convention Center in Bangkok, with Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul, Energy Minister Ekkanat Promphan, and executives from government agencies witnessing the opening ceremony. Kongkrapan Intarajang, Chief Executive Officer and President of PTT Public Company Limited, said that under the three-dimensional energy balance principle, PTT aims to maintain energy security alongside business growth, with natural gas and LNG serving as destination fuels that will play a role in the long-term energy system. On infrastructure, PTT Group operates over 4,500 kilometers of onshore and offshore natural gas pipelines, connected to two LNG terminals of PTT LNG Company Limited, or PTTLNG, which can handle the import, storage, and regasification of up to 19 million tons of LNG per year with 100% readiness and reliability. At the same time, PTT aims to accelerate the expansion of its LNG portfolio volume to 3.7 million tons in 2026, growing to 10 million tons in 2030 and 15 million tons by 2035, or roughly four times the 2026 target, in addition to procuring LNG through long-term contracts to meet domestic demand of 6.2 million tons per year. Meanwhile, Thailand's first CCS project at PTT Exploration and Production's Arthit natural gas field, which reached a final investment decision in 2025, can capture and reinject up to 1 million tons of carbon dioxide per year. PTT is also developing the Industrial Spark, or I-SPARK, project, as well as a Total Solution for Industrial Sustainability that integrates IoT, data science, and AI technologies to elevate energy services for Thailand's industrial sector.

PTT Group is holding an exhibition at Gastech 2026 as a co-host of the event, which runs from September 14 to 17, 2026, at the BITEC Exhibition and Convention Center in Bangkok. Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul, along with Energy Minister Ekkanat Promphan and executives from government agencies, witnessed the exhibition's opening ceremony. Dr. Kongkrapan Intarajang, Chief Executive Officer and President of PTT Public Company Limited, said that PTT places importance on the country's energy security alongside business growth, under the principle of a three-dimensional energy balance, with natural gas and LNG serving as destination fuels that will play a role in the long-term energy system. PTT Group operates more than 4,500 kilometers of onshore and offshore natural gas pipelines, connected to two LNG terminals with the capacity to import, store, and regasify up to 19 million tons of LNG per year, and has more than six international trading offices covering a trade network spanning over 80 countries. It aims to expand its LNG portfolio volume to 3.7 million tons in 2026, 10 million tons in 2030, and 15 million tons by 2035, in addition to procuring LNG through long-term contracts to meet domestic demand totaling 6.2 million tons per year. Meanwhile, Thailand's first CCS project at the Arthit natural gas field can capture and reinject up to 1 million tons of carbon dioxide per year, for which PTT Exploration and Production announced a final investment decision in 2025.