Exxon is among the suitors for Shell's U.S. chemicals business, a portfolio of four plants across Louisiana, Texas and Pennsylvania that could command $8 billion, the Financial Times reported citing people familiar with the process. The auction pits the largest U.S. supermajor against LyondellBasell, Apollo Global Management and Kuwait Petroleum Corporation, all of which have lodged non-binding offers that range from cherry-picking individual assets to taking the whole division.
The portfolio in play
Shell's stateside chemicals operation turns out the building blocks for plastics, detergents and a raft of industrial intermediates. The business has been a steady contributor, chemicals margins helped lift Shell's second-quarter adjusted earnings to $9.84 billion alongside higher oil and gas prices and stronger refining, but it no longer fits the capital-allocation framework the company laid out at its Capital Markets Day in 2025. Shell pledged then to "ensure capital is allocated where it can deliver the strongest long-term value," and asset sales have become the primary instrument of that shift.
A pattern of disposal
The chemicals auction follows two completed deals. TotalEnergies bought Shell's European onshore wind and solar portfolio, 500 megawatts operating and in development plus a project pipeline across Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and the UK, while Hungary's MOL paid $720 million for a 35 percent stake in Cyprus Offshore Block 12. That gas stake sale was explicitly tied to Shell's push to expand its liquefied natural gas footprint. Both transactions are subject to regulatory sign-off and expected to close by year-end.
What the bidders see
For Exxon, the assets would deepen an already dominant U.S. Gulf Coast chemicals position. LyondellBasell would add scale to its existing platform. Apollo and Kuwait Petroleum are financial and strategic buyers, respectively, betting on cyclical margin recovery. The spread of offer structures, partial versus full, suggests the sellers have not yet signaled a preferred outcome, and the final price could drift well below the $8 billion headline if the field narrows to piece-meal bids.
What to watch
Regulatory clearance for the renewables and Cyprus deals will set the tempo for the chemicals process, which Shell wants wrapped before 2027. The supermajor has demonstrated it can execute disposals at pace; the question is whether the chemicals business, still printing healthy margins, fetches a premium or simply clears the decks for the LNG pivot.