{"id":13525,"date":"2021-01-25T13:08:45","date_gmt":"2021-01-25T18:08:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/?p=13525"},"modified":"2021-01-25T13:08:45","modified_gmt":"2021-01-25T18:08:45","slug":"sec-investigating-exxon-based-on-whistleblower-complaint","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/sec-investigating-exxon-based-on-whistleblower-complaint\/","title":{"rendered":"SEC investigating Exxon based on whistleblower complaint"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>According to a report from the Wall Street Journal, Exxon is being investigated by the Securities and Exchange Commission after an employee filed a whistleblower complaint regarding how the company valued some of its oil and gas properties.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>According to the report, Exxon pressured its employees to use unrealistic assumptions regarding the values of assets in the Permian Basin, which is located in West Texas and Eastern New Mexico.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>The report claims that \u201cseveral\u201d people filed internal complaints regarding the pressure they felt they were subject to when valuing Exxon\u2019s permian holdings.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>At least one of the employees who complained was fired, and at least one filed an external complaint with the SEC. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Assert valuations have been a major topic of concern for major oil producers.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>Because of a short-lived price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia, oil and gas prices cratered early in 2020, and the ongoing COVID pandemic has reduced demand for oil, leaving prices low for an extended period of time and causing producers to re-evaluate how they have valued some of their most important assets.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>In June, Shell announced it would write down as much as $22 billion in assets.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>BP likewise said it would write down as much as $17 billion worth of assets.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 Another possible factor in t<\/span>he decline in value of oil producers\u2019 assets is the fact that shale wells have not produced as much oil and gas as they were projected to originally.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Under the SEC\u2019s whistleblower program, individuals who file a complaint and give information which leads to a penalty against a company can receive as much as 30% of the penalty.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>Complaints under the SEC\u2019s whistleblower program can be filed anonymously and confidentially. If you are aware of a company\u2019s dubious accounting practices when valuing assets, you should speak to an experienced whistleblower attorney as soon as possible. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Josh Borsellino is a Texas attorney that represents workers on whistleblower and retaliation claims.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>Mr. Borsellino can be reached at 817.908.9861 or via this <a href=\"mailto:josh@dfwcounsel.com\">email link<\/a>. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>He provides free evaluations of any whistleblower or retaliation claims. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to a report from the Wall Street Journal, Exxon is being investigated by the Securities and Exchange Commission after an employee filed a whistleblower complaint regarding how the company valued some of its oil and gas properties.\u00a0 According to the report, Exxon pressured its employees to use unrealistic assumptions regarding the values of assets&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3900],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13525"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13525"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13525\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dfwcounsel.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}