Occidental’s Jet Has Flown to the Netherlands, Tracking Data Show

(Bloomberg) -- Occidental Petroleum Corp.’s corporate jet has crossed the Atlantic for the second time in two weeks, landing in the Netherlands, according to flight-tracking data and people familiar with the matter.

A Gulfstream V belonging to the U.S. oil producer was at Rotterdam The Hague Airport as of Wednesday, information on FlightAirMap shows and two people familiar with the travel confirmed. An Occidental spokesman had no immediate comment.

While it’s unclear what Occidental’s jet is doing there, Royal Dutch Shell Plc is based in The Hague and has a joint venture in the Permian Basin with Anadarko Petroleum Corp., which Occidental is currently trying to buy for $38 billion. Shell declined to comment about Occidental’s jet.

Shell operates the venture, an arrangement it inherited when the company bought drilling rights from Chesapeake Energy Corp. in 2012. The two partners haven’t always seen eye-to-eye on operations, but opted to extend the pact in 2018. Production from the venture jumped 70% over the last year, Shell Chief Financial Officer Jessica Uhl told analysts on a conference call last week. Shell doesn’t see "a likely negative impact" from the sale of Anadarko, she said.

The path of the Occidental jet has been a useful guide in the past to key developments in the Anadarko takeover saga. The flight data showed the same aircraft was in Omaha, Nebraska, the home of Warren Buffett, on April 28. Two days later the legendary investor announced he was injecting $10 billion into Occidental, funding that helped the company raise the cash portion of its offer for Anadarko.

The data also showed the jet was in Paris on April 26. On May 5, Paris-based Total SA agreed with Occidental to acquire African assets currently belonging to Anadarko for $8.8 billion, contingent on the takeover being completed.

--With assistance from Kevin Crowley, Tina Davis, Joe Carroll, Christine Buurma and Rachel Adams-Heard.

To contact the reporters on this story: Simon Casey in New York at scasey4@bloomberg.net;Ed Hammond in New York at ehammond12@bloomberg.net;Kelly Gilblom in London at kgilblom@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Simon Casey at scasey4@bloomberg.net, Carlos Caminada, Tina Davis

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