Anglo-Dutch supermajor Shell could sell more than $10 billion of assets including its North Sea oilfields operations, sources close to the company are reported to have said. While most of the cuts are expected to come from the company’s downstream operations, which were hit hard during the global economic crisis, Shell is also is looking at a $5 billion disposal program for onshore fields in Nigeria, London’s Sunday Times newspaper reported, citing unnamed sources.
Shell has hired Credit Suisse to sell its $1 billion European liquefied petroleum gas arm, and first-round bids of about $500 million have also been lodged for a network of petrol stations across Africa, Reuters reported the paper said. Shell, Europe's second-largest oil company by market value, declined to comment.
It pledged $1 billion in cost cuts and to shave 1000 jobs in 2010, and upped its target for refinery divestments when it posted a 75% drop in fourth-quarter profits earlier this month. Shell is also contemplating an exit from Sweden, and a $1.2 billion auction of three European refineries, the paper said, according to the Reuters report.
