Occidental makes progress on asset sales, debt reduction

Occidental Petroleum said on August 6 that it had signed four agreements to sell certain assets in the Permian Basin. On a combined basis, the sales will generate around $950mn in proceeds and this will be used for debt reduction, according to the company.

The announcement came alongside Occidental’s second-quarter results. The company said of the total amount in proceeds, roughly $370mn worth of sales had already closed between April and July 2025. These transactions involved non-core and certain non-operated Permian Basin upstream assets that it described as not being not in its near-term development plans, which were sold off to undisclosed parties.

This was followed by an agreement Occidental entered into in July 2025 with an affiliate of Enterprise Products Partners to sell an entity that owns certain gas-gathering assets in the Permian’s Midland sub-basin for $580mn. Occidental noted that this agreement was subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory approval, including the expiration or termination of the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act waiting period. But assuming the agreement closes as expected, these transactions will bring the company’s total asset sales since it announced its acquisition of CrownRock in December 2023 to roughly $4bn.

The announcement went on to say that since July 2024, Occidental had repaid $7.5bn of debt, including proceeds from non-core Delaware Basin transactions that closed in April and July. On the company’s second-quarter earnings call, Occidental’s president and CEO, Vicki Hollub, said this equated to almost a 70% reduction of the debt raised for the CrownRock acquisition. The company expects to direct an additional $580mn to debt reduction upon the closing of the Midland Basin gas-gathering asset sale.

“We are pleased with how we continue to strategically strengthen our portfolio, and it’s rewarding to see those efforts drive debt reduction and create value for shareholders,” Hollub stated in the update on asset sales. “We believe Occidental has the best assets in our history and we will continue to find opportunities to high-grade our portfolio and generate long-term value.”

Occidental reported net income attributable to common stockholders of $288mn, or $0.26 per diluted share, for the second quarter of 2025. Its adjusted income came in at $396mn, or $0.39 per share. This was down from net income and adjusted income of $1.0bn, or $1.03 per share, in the second quarter of 2024.