By Sabrina Valle
(Reuters) – U.S. oil major Chevron Corp announced sweeping management changes on Sunday, including the retirement next year of its finance chief and extension of the mandatory retirement age for Chief Executive Officer Michael Wirth.
Chief Financial Officer Pierre Breber, 58, will retire in 2024, and will be replaced by the company’s technology chief Eimear Bonner, who will become only the second woman to be named chief financial officer in the company’s more than 140-year history.
Breber, who joined the company as a financial analyst in 1989, has been finance chief for the past three years and before that ran the company’s refining and chemicals business.
Bonner, 49, has been with Chevron for 24 years and became chief technology officer two years ago. Previously, she was general director of the Tengizchevroil in Kazakhstan, the company’s largest joint venture which produces about 700,000 barrels of oil per day.
“We’ve got a terrific leader who will come in as our next CFO, Eimear Bonner. She’s run big, complex businesses. I’m very confident that she’s going to be a great chief financial officer,” Wirth said in an interview on Sunday.
Wirth, who will turn 63 this year, has agreed to stay past the company’s mandatory retirement age of 65, Chevron said in an announcement.
“My commitments to our investors has been higher returns and lower carbon. I’ve got much more progress I want to make on both of those,” he said.
The company announced several other senior leadership changes. Balaji Krishnamurthy, currently vice president of Strategy & Sustainability, will become vice president of the Chevron Technical Center.
Molly Laegeler, currently vice president of Chevron’s San Joaquin Valley Business Unit, will become vice president of Strategy & Sustainability. And Frank Mount, currently vice president of M&A and Origination, will become vice president of Business Development.
Chevron has topped Wall Street’s earnings estimate for the second quarter, it said in a separate filing. It expects to report a $3.08 per share quarterly profit, above the $2.97 per share consensus, according to Refinitiv.
Chevron is due to report full quarterly results on Friday.
(Reporting by Mrinmay Dey and Shubhendu Deshmukh in Bengaluru; Editing by Cynthia Osterman and Diane Craft)
