Texaco, Chevron merger OK’d

Tuesday, Oct. 9, 2001 | 9:39 a.m.

SUN WIRE REPORTS

HOUSTON -- Chevron Corp. shareholders today approved the $45 billion purchase of Texaco Inc., a combination that will create the fourth-biggest investor-owned oil company.

The vote by shareholders, meeting in Houston, was almost unanimous. Texaco holders were to meet later today to vote on the transaction.

Shares of San Francisco-based Chevron rose 26 cents to $89.19 in early trading. They had risen 5.3 percent this year. Trading in ChevronTexaco Corp. is scheduled to begin Wednesday under the ticker symbol CVX.

Texaco is selling its interests in two gas station and refinery joint ventures to Shell Oil Co. and another partner for about $2.1 billion, paving the way for completion of Texaco's sale to Chevron.

Under the deals disclosed today, Shell and Saudi Refining Inc. are buying the Texaco stake in the joint ventures and would assume responsibility for about $1.7 billion in debt and other liabilities.

The deals would give Houston-based Shell sole ownership of Equilon Enterprises LLC, which operates about 4,500 Shell stations and 4,500 Texaco stations, primarily in the western United States.

Equilon, formed in 1998, also operates four refineries, a lubricants business and a pipeline and terminal network.

The other divestiture would give Shell and Saudi Refining Inc., a subsidiary of Aramco Services Co., equal interest in Motiva Enterprises LLC.

Motiva, likewise formed in 1998, operates mostly in the east and includes nearly 4,800 Shell stations and about 8,200 Texaco stations, four refineries and a network of terminals.

The Federal Trade Commission required the sale of Texaco's stakes in the joint ventures as a condition of its recent approval of the Chevron-Texaco merger pact which was announced a year ago.

ChevronTexaco would be the second-largest U.S. based energy company behind Exxon Mobil Corp. and the fifth largest in the world, with some 25,000 retail outlets on six continents, revenues of nearly $117 billion and gas and oil reserves totaling more than 11 billion barrels.