(2 of 10)
The sea change has not only afflicted all oilmen but has also left them open to new forms of criticism. All have been tarred with the same vague but pervasive public suspicion that they have conspired to create the shortage-a charge for which there is no evidence-or at minimum have taken advantage of it to enrich themselves by raising prices. Much of the attack focuses on Exxon's executives, ranging downward from Canadian-born Chairman John Kenneth Jamieson (see box following page). Such men are several light-years removed from the vulgar, wheeler-dealer, overnight Texas oil millionaires of popular myth and occasional reality. Still, as successors of Founder John D. Rockefeller, they must contend with memories of the evils of the old Standard Oil Trust. Moreover, Exxon executives are inviting scapegoats simply because their company has more wells, refineries. pipelines and tankers than any other.
For the same reasons, the Exxon chiefs stand the best chance of coping with the new environment of shortage. The company's size and diversity limit its vulnerability. In 1973 Exxon rolled up worldwide sales of $28.5 billion -about the same as the NATO defense budget. Rigs working for Exxon or companies that it partly owns bring up oil from the Arctic tundra, the Arabian deserts, the Gulf of Mexico and Venezuela's Lake Maracaibo. Gasoline, jet fuel and heating oil are distilled from the crude at refineries in Benicia, Calif., Rotterdam, Ras Tanura in Saudi Arabia, and Singapore. Pumps blazoning the names Exxon or Esso (still widely used outside the U.S.) dispense gasoline in Canadian fishing villages, Zaire jungle outposts and along war-torn roads in Viet Nam.
If Exxon were shorn of all its foreign operations, it would still be the ninth or tenth largest U.S. industrial company-even though it gets only 16% of its oil production and 32% of its sales from the U.S. Orphaned from their corporate parent, Exxon's petrochemical operations, which produce materials that go into fertilizers, records, pantyhose and myriad other products, would rank about fifth among U.S. chemical companies. If Exxon merely transported oil, it would be the world's biggest shipping firm, with 155 tankers of its own and varying numbers under charter at sea. In finance it is a substantial international banker, holding fortunes in marks, yen, francs, pounds and dollars.
When profits fall in one part of its empire, Exxon usually rolls with the punch because profits rise in another part. In 1972 profits fell sharply in Venezuela because of higher taxes, but they rose in the U.S. and Canada because of higher crude production. Last year, despite the criticism in Congress that oil companies earned extortionate profits, Exxon's net income in the U.S. climbed only 16%, hardly excessive in a rapidly surging economy; meanwhile, huge demand lifted its net income in the Eastern Hemisphere by 83%. If Exxon's foreign oil concessions are taken over in the future, the company will still profit by shipping, refining and marketing the oil. To prepare for the day when conventional wells can no longer meet the world's needs, Exxon is already experimentally squeezing oil out of Rocky Mountain shale and the tar sands of northern Alberta's