US majors’ planned Caspian exit puts Baku in a bind

Azerbaijan may find it much tougher to find investment after the departure of Chevron and ExxonMobil

The start of commercial gas deliveries to Turkey from the Shah Deniz 2 field last July imbued Azerbaijan's hydrocarbons sector with a sense of positivity. But 2018 ended on a downbeat note when reports emerged that Chevron and ExxonMobil intended to withdraw from the largest Caspian oilfield development, Azeri-Chirag-Deepwater Gunashli (ACG). The planned exit of these US majors comes at a tricky time for the Azeri government. Baku needs to maintain the flow of investment into exploration and production at a time when political risk in the Caspian region is mounting. This is due, in part, to the intensified sanctions squeeze being imposed on neighbour Iran by the administration of US presiden