Reply #10: BP Replaces Hayward, Quickens Asset Sales on Loss (Update1) [View All]

July 27 (Bloomberg) -- BP Plc appointed U.S.-born Robert Dudley as chief executive officer and pledged to accelerate asset sales to as much as $30 billion after the Gulf of Mexico oil spill led to a record loss.

The second-quarter net loss of $17.2 billion compared with a profit of $4.39 billion in the year-earlier period. Dudley will take over from Tony Hayward on Oct. 1, the London-based company said in a statement today.

Dudley’s challenge will be to overcome cleanup costs and liabilities after the company booked a pre-tax charge of $32.2 billion related to the leak. BP is selling assets over the next 18 months, reducing investment and cutting the dividend to pay the bills after the spill wiped 45 billion pounds ($70 billion) off the company’s market value.

P said last week that it sold $7 billion of assets in the U.S., Canada and Egypt to Apache Corp. It also plans to sell holdings in Pakistan and Vietnam. BP may revive the sale of fields in Alaska after they failed to make it into the Apache deal, two people with knowledge of the matter said last week.

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