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Healthy Competition in the Oil Industry? Consider This...
Interlocking ownership among major oil companies means you often can't be sure whose gas you're really buying.
By Kyle Pickford
Start Date: 4/10/99
Concerned about gas prices? Worried that there may not be enough competition in the oil industry? Let's look at this issue through a typical consumer's perspective.
Say you're filling your tank at a company-owned service station. A Shell sign high above the station proudly proclaims the station's ownership. Or does it? Well, not exactly. The station is actually owned by Equilon, a company jointly owned by Shell and Texaco. Equilon also owns the Texaco station across the street, unless, of course, it's a Texaco STAR station, which is owned in part by the government of Saudi Arabia.
But Shell produces its own oil, right? Well, not always. For example, in California, Shell produces no oil itself, but rather owns part of a company called AERA, whose only job is to produce oil. AERA is also owned in part by Mobil, who is being bought by Exxon. And AERA just bought all of the California oil properties of ARCO, who is being bought by BP, who also owns Sohio, and Amoco. But ironically, BP refineries and gas stations in Europe are owned in part by Mobil, who -- as we have already said -- will soon be owned by Exxon.
And Texaco, who also owns Getty, derives a large portion of its profits from Caltex, one of Asia's largest oil companies. Texaco owns Caltex in partnership with Chevron, who also owns Gulf, and who has reportedly been in discussions to buy Texaco itself, who, of course, is a part owner of the Shell station where you are now filling your tank.
[Kyle Pickford is a California-based consultant to the oil industry.]
 Excelsior, Michael Lindemann's new novel (written under the pen name Michael Paul), depicts a wholly plausible near future in which human cloning is both widespread and widely abused; terrorists have access to target-specific biological weapons; recreational space travel is commonplace; and mounting pressures of global climate change, environmental decline, population growth and civil unrest inspire radical new approaches to urban security.
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