Chevron Corporation

Good morning. My name is Katie, and I will be your conference facilitator today. Welcome to Chevron's second quarter 2023 earnings conference call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session, and instructions will be given at that time. If anyone should require assistance during the conference call, please press star then zero on your touchtone telephone. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. I will now turn the conference call over to General Manager of Investor Relations of Chevron Corporation, Mr. Jake Stewing. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Katie. Welcome to Chevron's second quarter 2023 earnings conference call and webcast. I'm Jake Spearing, general manager of investor relations. Our chairman and CEO, Mike Worth, and CFO, Pierre Breber, are on the call with me today. We will refer to slides and prepare remarks that are available on Chevron's website. Before we begin, please be reminded that this presentation contains estimates, projections, and other forward-looking statements. Please review the cautionary statement on slide two. Now I will turn it over to Mike.

Thanks Jake, and thank you everyone for joining us today. Earlier this week, we announced several senior leadership changes, including Pierre's plans to retire next year, along with second quarter performance highlights. In a few minutes, Pierre will share more details on our financials, which included return on capital employed greater than 12% for the eighth consecutive quarter, and another quarterly record in shareholder distributions, more than $7 billion. At TCO, we're making good progress with commissioning and pre-startup activities, including introducing fuel gas to new facilities. In the third quarter, we expect mechanical completion for the future growth project and to complete a major turnaround. Cost and schedule guidance is unchanged. Conversion of the field from high pressure to low pressure is expected to begin late this year, and FGP is on track to start up by mid next year. we have unused contingency, which gives us confidence that we'll complete the project within the total budget. After completion of these projects, TCO is expected to deliver production greater than 1 million barrels of oil equivalent per day and generate about $5 billion of free cash flow, Chevron's share, at $60 Brent in 2025. Chevron's Permian production set another record in the second quarter. about 5% above the previous quarterly high. We expect next quarter's production to be roughly flat before growing again in the fourth quarter, on track with our full-year guidance. Early 2023 well performance in our company-operated assets in all three areas is consistent with our plans. In New Mexico, we've put on production 10 wells. Before year-end, we expect to pop an additional 30 wells with higher expected production rates. As a reminder, about half of Chevron's production is company-operated, with a balanced non-operated and royalty production. While short-term well performance is one measure, we're focused on maximizing value from our unique, large resource base, expected to deliver decades of high-return production. Over the next five years, we expect to develop over 2,200 net new wells. growing production while delivering return on capital employed near 30% and free cash flow greater than $5 billion in 2027 at $60 Brent. Longer term, we've identified well over 6,000 economic net well locations that support a plateau greater than 1 million barrels per day through the end of next decade. Our deep resource inventory and advantaged royalty position allow us to optimize our development plans for high returns, incorporating learnings and technology improvements as we expect to deliver strong free cash flow for years to come. In the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, the floating production unit anchor is on location and the project remains on track for first oil next year. We continue to build on our exploration success and were awarded the highest number of blocks in the most recent lease round. In the Eastern Med, our Aphrodite appraisal well in Cyprus met our expectations, and we've submitted a development concept to the government. At Leviathan, we're expanding pipeline capacity to nearly 1.4 BCF per day. We expect to close our acquisition of PDC Energy in August after their shareholder vote next week. Our teams are working on integration plans, and we look forward to welcoming PDC's talented employees to Chevron. Now over to Pierre.