Would this be why the UK government chickened out of implementing a windfall tax?
The amount of extra tax proposed by the EU is 2 billion out of their profits of 20 billion.
They say that it will affect investment, but their investment plans have already been made and this is pure profit. Greedy pigs!
Looks like it’s a pre-emptive move
What a waste of taxpayer’s money!
Not that I use them often, to but time to stop buying fuel from Esso.
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Agree - easy enough at branded stations but who supplies the various supermarkets with their fuel?
Tesco is BP/Shell I think. No idea about the French outlets.
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Good question. No idea… yet. Time to do some digging via Google 
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Reminds me of way back in the '70s (was it?) when cut price petrol first came on the market at the rapidly spreading Jet stations. This was before the supermarkets got in on the act.
There was much discussion about where Jet got their fuel from and so a documentary maker organised a ‘tail’ on a Jet fuel tanker, and it went straight back to the big companies like Shell etc.
Far more complicated than that. Tesco will buy its fuel where it can based on price. The link below indicates what goes on at Buncefield which is a part of a huge UK pipeline system.
Have they?
Nothing has been done so far, but they don’t actually consult me.
Why does that not surprise me.
There is the 35% Energy Profits Levy, does that count as a ‘windfall tax’? 
The executives of Exxon have a responsibility to protect the financial interests of the shareholders and if they just rolled over and accepted that tax they could be accused of not doing so. Despite my having no sympathy for them I guess they’ve really no choice but to challenge the tax. I hope they don’t win 
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As in the fiduciary duty principle?
This isn’t my area of expertise so I’m happy to stand corrected on this, but I believe this was addressed by the Freshfields Report almost 20 years ago, that said a company’s commitment to Environmental, Social and Governance issues isn’t impacted by their fiduciary duty.
This was then expanded upon in 2009 by “Fiduciary II”.
As I said, I’m not an expert so my understanding may be incorrect but my previous employer was a supplier of software to the Big 4, and even they all had very stringent requirements about ESG.
I’m not an expert either but I understood that, by signing the TTIP agreement (if I’ve got those initials right) governments agreed they could be sued if they interfered with a company’s inalienable right to make a profit hower it was done. The test case I think was the destruction of the Canadian tundra in the search for oil?
As you can tell from the above waffle I could have got this all wrong but my lasting impression was that governments and the EU had shot themselves in the foot by signing said agreement. Someone who is much more up to date than me about this will, I imagine, correct me 
Oh, interesting… I should look into this.
I’m not an expert either 
But I guess the impact on Exxon senior execs performance pay and options might be a factor too.
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Hi there.
I’m Shell Oil Company and I have interests in 748 productive oil wells.
Now the Russians have started a war in Ukraine and so I’m going to tell you that there MIGHT be a shortage of oil. Of course there isn’t actually a shortage at all (How many Shell stations have you seen with ‘Sorry – Out of stock’ signs ?) But anyway, there MIGHT be a shortage some day, so I’m going to take this opportunity to tell you that it now costs substantially more to extract oil from our 748 wells, which is of course substantially untrue. I have lots of friends in high places, so no-one is going challenge what I say.
Conveniently each barrel of oil I extract passes through many ‘divisions’ of Shell, and each one operates on a percentage profit basis. So if I hike the price of a barrel of crude by 10% because there MIGHT be a shortage some day, then because every Shell division takes a percentage profit on top of the original 10%, I’m going to make an absolutely obscene fortune.
Of course I could have chosen not to increase the price at all, in which case I would still be making the profits I was benefiting from before the Russians invaded Ukraine. But then I’m incredibly greedy, and as the unbridled capitalist system allows me to increase prices just because there MIGHT be a shortage, then that is what I am going to do.
Do I care that the consequences of my actions will increase inflation, and cause millions of people financial hardship ? No, of course not. I, and my shareholders, am ‘All Right Jack’, and we are very happy to take your money on the basis of a problem that MIGHT arise, because that is the business system that the governmental representatives of the people have permitted, and often actually encouraged, to come into being.
Of course I don’t like Windfall Taxes, or indeed any other form of tax, because I am so greedy. Mind you, having the discussion about taxes at least deflects attention away from the reality that perhaps I and my fellow oil industry companies should really be rounded up and charged with conspiracy to defraud.
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