ExxonMobil has moved forward on two fronts of its international energy strategy this week, advancing plans for a substantial new offshore drilling campaign in Guyana while signing a preliminary agreement to supply liquefied natural gas to a power project in South Africa. The US supermajor has applied for environmental authorisation to drill up to 35 new exploration and appraisal wells in Guyana's Stabroek block, with the campaign expected to run from 2028 through 2033. Separately, the company has reached a preliminary agreement to supply LNG to the Zululand Energy Terminal, which is being developed as South Africa's first LNG import facility.

The two announcements, arriving within days of each other, illustrate how Exxon is pursuing growth through different commercial models depending on the region. ExxonMobil is currently producing close to 900,000 barrels per day in Guyana and plans to increase capacity to 1.7 million barrels per day by 2030, with the new drilling campaign aimed at four prospect areas and structured across nine phases. The Stabroek project sits alongside the company's other resource-heavy asset base, including its shale operations in the Permian Basin, and represents continued investment in production where Exxon already holds operational control and established infrastructure.

The South Africa arrangement takes a different shape. ExxonMobil South Africa LNG Ltd has signed a Heads of Agreement with the Zululand Energy Terminal as a preliminary supply partner, without taking an equity stake in the terminal itself. The terminal's first phase is expected to include a floating storage unit with capacity of 170,000 cubic metres and an onshore regasification system handling around 400 million cubic feet a day. State utility Eskom has already signed on as a foundation customer to support its planned 3,000 megawatt gas-to-power project. Rather than owning upstream production in South Africa, Exxon is positioning itself as a contracted gas supplier, a structure that ties revenue to long-term offtake agreements rather than asset ownership and operating risk.

This pattern fits into a wider context. Oil markets have been volatile in recent months following the US-Iran peace agreement and the associated reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, developments that briefly unsettled crude pricing and prompted Asian buyers to reconsider their reliance on Middle Eastern supply routes. Exxon's geographically diversified portfolio, spanning the Americas and now sub-Saharan Africa, provides some insulation from any single region's disruption, even as the company continues to weigh further expansion in Asia-Pacific.

That regional ambition has drawn particular scrutiny over the past fortnight. Reports emerged that ExxonMobil is assessing possible acquisition targets including Australia's Woodside Energy Group as it seeks to expand further into LNG and strengthen its footprint in Asian energy markets. Woodside has said it is not in discussions with ExxonMobil and is unaware of any approach, and people familiar with Exxon's deliberations stress that the talks, if they exist in any formal sense, remain at an early internal stage with no certainty of a bid materialising. Exxon has been seen as lagging behind European rivals Shell and TotalEnergies in building a diversified, multi-basin LNG portfolio, and any move on Woodside would be read as an attempt to close that gap and compete on global scale.

Markets have offered a mixed verdict on the company's recent run of announcements. XOM shares closed at $141.86, having fallen roughly 5 per cent over the past week and around 10 per cent over the past month, a pullback that traces partly to broader sector weakness and shifting oil price expectations. The picture looks different over a longer horizon. The stock remains up more than 15 per cent for the year and has gained over 167 per cent across five years, a trajectory that helps explain why investors have generally continued to back long-cycle project announcements such as Guyana and South Africa rather than reacting sharply to short-term price swings in the sector.

None of these projects come without risk. The Stabroek campaign and the Zululand terminal both require heavy upfront capital commitments, and Guyana's drilling plan still needs to clear a public consultation period before regulators grant final approval. The South African terminal has not reached a final investment decision and faces its own questions over financing and contracted volumes. Execution risk on projects of this scale remains considerable, given the multi-year timelines involved and the dependence on partners, regulators and offtake customers all moving in step. How these ventures progress, alongside whatever comes of the Woodside speculation, will shape the regional balance of Exxon's production base and its exposure to contract-linked gas revenue in the years ahead.

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