Big Oil is a name sometimes used to describe the world's five, six or seven largest publicly traded and investor-owned oil and gas companies, also known as supermajors.
The term, particularly in the United States, emphasizes their economic power and influence on politics. Big Oil is often associated with the fossil fuels lobby and also used to refer to the industry as a whole in a pejorative or derogatory manner.
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Shell plc is a British multinational oil and gas company, headquartered in London, United Kingdom. Shell is a public limited company with a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and secondary listings on Euronext Amsterdam and the New York Stock Exchange. A core component of Big Oil, Shell is the second largest investor-owned oil and gas company in the world by revenue (after ExxonMobil), and among the world's largest companies out of any industry. Measured by both its own emissions, and the emissions of all the fossil fuels it sells, Shell was the ninth-largest corporate producer of greenhouse gas emissions in the period 1988–2015.
Shell was formed in April 1907 through the merger of Royal Dutch Petroleum Company of the Netherlands and The "Shell" Transport and Trading Company of the United Kingdom. The combined company rapidly became the leading competitor of the American Standard Oil and by 1920 Shell was the largest producer of oil in the world. Shell first entered the chemicals industry in 1929. Shell was one of the "Seven Sisters" which dominated the global petroleum industry from the mid-1940s to the mid-1970s. In 1964, Shell was a partner in the world's first commercial sea transportation of liquefied natural gas (LNG). In 1970, Shell acquired the mining company Billiton, which it subsequently sold in 1994 and now forms part of BHP. In recent decades gas has become an increasingly important part of Shell's business and Shell acquired BG Group in 2016.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC /ˈoʊpɛk/ OH-pek) is an organization enabling the co-operation of leading oil-producing and oil-dependent countries in order to collectively influence the global oil market and maximize profit. It was founded on 14 September 1960 in Baghdad by the first five members: Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. The organization, which currently comprises 12 member countries, accounted for 38 percent of global oil production, according to a 2022 report. Additionally, it is estimated that 79.5 percent of the world's proven oil reserves are located within OPEC nations, with the Middle East alone accounting for 67.2 percent of OPEC's total reserves.
In a series of steps in the 1960s and 1970s, OPEC restructured the global system of oil production in favor of oil-producing states and away from an oligopoly of dominant Anglo-American oil firms (the "Seven Sisters"). In the 1970s, restrictions in oil production led to a dramatic rise in oil prices with long-lasting and far-reaching consequences for the global economy. Since the 1980s, OPEC has had a limited impact on world oil-supply and oil-price stability, as there is frequent cheating by members on their commitments to one another, and as member commitments reflect what they would do even in the absence of OPEC.
Gulf Oil was a major American global oil company, in operation from 1901 to 1985. The eighth-largest American manufacturing company in 1941 and the ninth largest in 1979, Gulf Oil was one of the Seven Sisters oil companies. Prior to its merger with Standard Oil of California, Gulf was one of the chief instruments of the Mellon family fortune; both Gulf and Mellon Financial had their headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with Gulf's headquarters, the Gulf Tower, being Pittsburgh's tallest building until the completion of the U.S. Steel Tower.
Gulf Oil Corporation (GOC) ceased to exist as an independent company in 1985, when it merged with Standard Oil of California (SOCAL), with both rebranding as Chevron in the United States. Gulf Canada, Gulf's main Canadian subsidiary, was sold the same year with retail outlets to Ultramar and Petro-Canada and what became Gulf Canada Resources to Olympia & York.
The Consortium Agreement of 1954 (Persian: قرارداد کنسرسیوم) provided Western oil companies with 50% ownership of Iranian oil production after its ratification in 1954 expiring in 1979. According to the consortium agreement, 40% of Iran's oil shares belonged to 5 American companies, the other 40% belonged to Iran-UK oil companies, 14% belonged to a Dutch oil company, and the remaining 6% belonged to a French oil company. In spite of numerous negotiations and offers, Mohammad Reza Shah refused to extend the Agreement which originally and clearly postulated that the Consortium had the right to prolong it 15 years (3 times 5 years).
Following the 1911 Supreme Court ruling that found Standard Oil was an illegal monopoly, the company was broken up into 39 different entities, divided primarily by region and activity. Many of these companies later became part of the Seven Sisters, which dominated global petroleum production in the 20th century, and became a majority of today's largest investor-owned oil companies, with most tracing their roots back to Standard Oil. Some descendants of Standard Oil were also given exclusive rights to the Standard Oil name.
Today, many of Standard Oil's 39 successor entities play roles in the oil industry, either on their own or through being acquired by other companies. Standard Oil of New Jersey, the controlling division of Standard Oil at the time of the 1911 breakup, continues to exist as ExxonMobil, formed from the merger of it and Standard Oil of New York. BP has also acquired many Standard Oil descendants, most notably Standard Oil of Ohio and Amoco (Standard Oil of Indiana). Saudi Aramco, the state-owned oil company of Saudi Arabia, also traces its origins to Standard Oil as the Arab kingdom founded it in a partnership with Standard Oil of California, today known as Chevron Corporation. Other companies themselves not primarily focused on the petroleum industry have owned or previously owned Standard Oil descendants, including U.S. Steel (which previously owned Marathon Oil), the first incarnation of DuPont (which previously owned Conoco), and Unilever (which presently owns Chesebrough and Vaseline). Among Standard Oil's largest non-petroleum descendants is the credit bureau TransUnion, which originally was divested from the Standard-descending Union Tank Car Company.