Exxon Falls After Report of SEC Probe into Permian Valuation
- Complaints made following an internal assessment, report says
- Exxon says the reported claims are ‘demonstrably false’
Photographer: Daniel Acker/Bloomberg
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Exxon Mobil Corp. slumped after a newspaper report said the company is being investigated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for allegedly overvaluing a key asset in the Permian Basin.
The probe stems from a whistleblower complaint that during a 2019 internal assessment workers were forced to use unrealistic assumptions about how quickly wells could be drilled to reach a higher valuation, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. At least one of the workers who complained was fired in 2020, the Journal said.