Chevron Corporation

Good morning. My name is Justin, and I will be your conference facilitator today. Welcome to Chevron's second quarter 2024 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 and then zero on your touchtone telephone. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. I will now turn the conference call over to the General Manager of Investor Relations of Chevron Corporation, Mr. Jake Spearing. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Justin. Welcome to Chevron's second quarter 2024 earnings conference call and webcast. I'm Jake Spearing, Head of Investor Relations. Our Chairman and CEO, Mike Worth, and CFO, Emer Bonner, are on the call with me today. We will refer to the slides and prepared 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. A reconciliation of non-GAAP measures can be found in the appendix to this presentation. Please review the cautionary statement on slide two. Now, I will turn it over to Mike.

Thanks, Jake. This quarter, Chevron delivered strong production and extended our track record of consistent shareholder returns. production increased by more than 11% from the prior year and included a new quarterly record in the Permian. Over the past two years, we've returned over $50 billion to shareholders, approximately 18% of our market cap. We continue to advance growth opportunities in our traditional and new energies businesses through adding new exploration plays in West Africa and South America, achieving key milestones on the ACES Green Hydrogen Project, and commissioning of the Geismar Renewal Diesel Plan expansion, which is expected to come online by the end of the year. The merger with Hess achieved a successful shareholder vote, and we now expect the FTC review process to conclude in the third quarter. The arbitration panel addressing the Staybrook JOA has set a hearing for next year. Hess had requested an earlier hearing, but the panel ultimately sets the schedule. We remain confident this is a straightforward matter, and the outcome will affirm a preemption right does not apply. We're committed to the merger and look forward to combining the two companies. In the Gulf of Mexico, we're leveraging our deepwater expertise with plans to deliver high cash margin, low carbon intensity production growth. First Oil and Anchor is imminent, delivering the industry's first deepwater 20,000-pound development. The project is on track to come in under budget while deploying multiple breakthrough technologies. After Anchor, three more projects are scheduled to come online, and we expect production to grow to 300,000 barrels a day by 2026. Our developments have become more capital efficient, unit drilling costs have come down, and facility designs are optimized for high returns. As one of the largest leaseholders in the Basin, we are well positioned for the future, with leading technology capability and attractive exploration opportunities near existing infrastructure and in frontier areas. In the Permian, Base business performance continues to improve with higher reliability and lower decline rates. Development activity continues to get more efficient. We're one of the first operators to deploy triple frac, delivering cost reductions of more than 10% and shortening completion times by 25% where applied. In the Delaware Basin, company-operated well performance continues to improve as we optimize development strategies. In the Midland Basin, early well results are lower versus last year. Our program in the second half of the year is more heavily weighted to development targets than we expect to perform better. With strong momentum in our operated portfolio and predictable results from our non-operated and royalty acreage, we now expect full-year production growth of about 15% and fourth quarter production to average around 940,000 barrels per day. At TCO, cost and schedule guidance is unchanged, with FGP expected to start up in the first half of 2025. We continue to bring major equipment online and complete key project milestones. Eight out of 21 metering stations have been converted to low pressure. Three pressure boost facility compressors are in operation. A third gas turbine generator is in service. The first 3GP process system is ready for operation, and we completed the SGI turnaround on time and under budget. The wells converted to low pressure are meeting expectations and the pressure boost facilities are operating with high reliability. Over the next two quarters, we'll continue converting the field to low pressure while further commissioning key equipment for FGP. The project team remains focused on completing the project safely and starting up reliably to deliver value to Kazakhstan, TCO, and shareholders. This quarter was a little light due to some operational and other discrete items that impacted results, but I remain confident we're well positioned to deliver on long-term earnings and cash flow growth. Now I'll turn it over to Emer to cover the details.