The oil company Hess Corp. said late Tuesday that shareholders voted in favour of Chevron Corp.’s plan to buy the company for $53 billion.
Chevron CVX, +0.82% announced its plan to buy Exxon Mobil XOM, +1.27% in October, but the deal has hit some snags recently. Exxon Mobil threatened to kill the deal by increasing its stake in an oil project in Guyana, and some Democrats in Congress have asked regulators to ‘pump the brakes’ on the deal, saying it could cause petrol prices to rise.
Hess HES, +0.44% said that at a special meeting on Tuesday, most of the shareholders voted in favour of the merger. “We are very pleased that the majority of our stockholders recognise the compelling value of this strategic transaction and look forward to the successful completion of our merger with Chevron,” CEO John Hess said in a statement.
Hess, based in New York, said that the merger will only go through if certain conditions are met. It did not give a timeline, but said that it and Chevron hope to close the deal “as soon as practicable.”
With a market value of about $46.6 billion, Hess shares are up about 5.5% so far this year. Chevron’s stock has gone up about 7%, giving the company a market value of about $290 billion.
