Crude Slump Sees Oil Majors’ Debt Burden Double to $138 Billion
- Net debt for top five oil firms has risen tenfold since 2008
- Big oil companies tell investors debt load will rise further
Have Oil Prices Bottomed Out?
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When commodity prices crashed in late 2014, oil executives could look at their mining counterparts with a sense of superiority.
Back then, the world’s biggest oil companies enjoyed relatively strong balance sheets, with little borrowing relative to the value of their assets. Miners entered the slump in a very different state and some of the world’s largest -- Rio Tinto Plc, Anglo American Plc and Glencore Plc -- had to reduce dividends and employ draconian spending cuts to bring their debt under control.