The Guardian

Last-minute bid to stop Shell’s oil exploration in whale breeding grounds in South Africa

Campaigners have filed legal challenge against seismic survey along Eastern Cape province

Jillian Ambrose Energy correspondent: Wed 1 Dec 2021 06.00 GMT

An 11th hour bid has been launched to try to halt plans by Royal Dutch Shell to explore for oil in vital whale breeding grounds along the Wild Coast of eastern South Africa.

Campaigners filed an urgent legal challenge against the seismic survey, which was scheduled to begin on Wednesday, in a last-ditch bid to prevent it harming whales, dolphins and seals in the relatively untouched marine environment. read more

CITI A.M.

Shell holds talks with investors to push through London HQ move

BY: NICHOLAS EARL: TUESDAY 23 NOVEMBER 2021 4:28 PM

Royal Dutch Shell is looking to persuade investors to back its plan to relocate the company’s headquarters from the Netherlands to UK.

The oil giant’s management team has set up more than 100 meetings with leading investors in recent days to push through historic company, sources told Reuters.

Shell announced earlier this month they would scrap dual Anglo-Dutch share structure, move to London from The Hague, and ditch the Royal Dutch branding after 114 years of holding the name. read more

Express.co.uk

Brexit success: Shell headquarter move shows Remoaner predictions are ‘other way around’

OIL giant Shell is relocating its headquarters from the Netherlands to the UK, a move some are labelling as proof that Brexit is not synonymous with losing foreign business.

By TERESA GOTTEIN MARTINEZ

Sat, Nov 20, 2021 

Shell has this week announced it was ready to sacrifice the designation “Royal” — from Royal Dutch Shell — to shift its tax residency from the EU to the UK. It already chose the country as its corporate base and primary stock market listing in 2005 but now, “despite Brexit“, the British-Dutch multinational will call London its only home. read more

Brinkwire

Shell is ‘doing its own Brexit,’ with a massive EU snub in favor of the UK move.

BY HELENA SUTAN ON NOVEMBER 20, 2021

Shell is ‘doing its own Brexit,’ with a massive EU snub in favor of the UK move.

THE European Union has been shattered after it was revealed that oil giant Shell is “doing its own Brexit” by moving its headquarters from the Netherlands to the United Kingdom, with one political expert dubbing the news a “political bomb.”

Royal Dutch Shell is getting rid of its dual share structure and relocating its headquarters from the Netherlands to the United Kingdom, which is a huge win for the Brexit campaign. read more

Brinkwire

Shell’s move to a new headquarters in London demonstrates that Remoaner predictions are ‘wrong’.

BY HELENA SUTAN ON NOVEMBER 20, 2021

Shell’s move to a new headquarters demonstrates that Remoaner predictions are ‘wrong’.

Shell, the world’s largest oil company, is relocating its headquarters from the Netherlands to the United Kingdom, a move that some see as proof that Brexit does not imply a loss of international business.

Shell announced this week that it was willing to forego the designation “Royal” — from Royal Dutch Shell — in order to move its tax residency from the EU to the UK. The British-Dutch multinational had already chosen the country as its corporate base and primary stock market listing in 2005, but now it will call London its only home “despite Brexit.” read more

Seeking Alpha

Shell Jumps Out Of Fire And Lands In The Frying Pan

Zoltan Ban: Nov. 19, 2021

• Shell’s move to exit the Dutch tax and legal jurisdiction is officially presented as an issue of dividend taxation that Shell and others hoped for years to see it repealed.
• Though it is not much discussed by Shell or the media, the harsh environmental ruling by a Dutch court that forces Shell to cut emissions may have played a role.
• Even though Shell is not currently faced with similar legal pressures in the UK, it may nevertheless feel other pressures to cut emissions by a similar margin.
• Shell’s upstream segment is the most likely part of the business that will be sacrificed to environmental pressures.
• Shell will most likely try to adapt its LNG and petrochemicals sector to lower emissions, that will make it less profitable. Higher natural gas prices will add to profitability concerns.

Investment thesis: Shell (RDS.A), (RDS.B) is leaving the Dutch legal jurisdiction, officially due to some dividend tax issues and it will make the UK its sole home base. Unofficially, it may be in large part a way to escape a court-imposed emissions reduction demand on its business activities. While the move to escape a legally binding cut of 45% compared with 2020 levels by 2030 is potentially avoided through this move, the internal, as well as external pressures for it to cut emissions, hydrocarbons production, and so on, will not cease. read more

Bloomberg

Dutch Divorce: How Shell Split With Netherlands After 114 Years

Laura Hurst, Diederik Baazil and Fred Pals: Wed, November 17, 2021, 8:10 AM

(Bloomberg) — A twenty-minute stroll through The Hague — the pretty but low-key city that houses The Netherlands’ government — takes you from the prime minister’s office to the workplace of someone who’s arguably even more powerful: the CEO of Royal Dutch Shell Plc.

But when Ben van Beurden, who’s worked at Shell since he graduated from nearby Delft University in 1983, called Mark Rutte on Sunday afternoon, the conversation was anything but close. He rang to tell the PM that Europe’s biggest oil company was moving its headquarters to London, a step that would simplify its corporate structure and cut taxes for investors. read more

EUobserver

Dutch government’s attempt to keep Shell fails

By WESTER VAN GAAL: BRUSSELS, 17 Nov 2021

A last-ditch attempt to keep the oil and gas giant Shell in the Netherlands has failed.

Shell had pressured the Dutch government to drop its dividend tax for “16 years” chief executive Ben van Beurden told newspaper Het Financieele Dagblad.

Hoping to persuade the oil major from leaving after more than a century, outgoing economic affairs minister Stef Blok and finance minister Hans Vijlbrief tried to barter a deal with representatives from other parties in a last-ditch effort to hastily scrap the dividend tax, before Shell’s planned 10 December general shareholder meeting. read more

FORTUNE

Shell’s decision to leave the Netherlands is about keeping investors on its side in difficult times

BY KATHERINE DUNN: November 16, 2021 4:58 PM GMT

The Dutch government is scrambling to find a way to make Royal Dutch Shell remain royal and Dutch after the oil and gas giant announced Monday that it had decided to up sticks from its home in the Hague and move its headquarters to London.

The Dutch government’s eagerness to retain the giant firm is not surprising—and exactly how Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and his cabinet are trying to do so says a lot about which of Shell’s stated reasons for moving is the most important one. read more

The Telegraph

Shell turns its back on Royal Dutch heritage after climate ruling and dividend tax

Shell’s jumping ship to the UK bids farewell to over 130 years of association with the Dutch monarchy

By Matt Oliver 15 November 2021 • 6:09pm

For more than 130 years, Royal Dutch Shell has boasted of its historic links with the royal family of the Netherlands.

The energy behemoth can trace its heritage back to a charter granted by King William III for oil exploration in Indonesia in 1890, making it one of the world’s oldest energy companies and a trailblazer of modern capitalism. read more

Minister hails ‘vote of confidence’ for Brexit Britain as Shell moves its HQ to London from the Netherlands and plans to scrap ‘Royal Dutch’ from its name

• Kwasi Kwarteng said decision – subject to a vote – would ‘create jobs’ in Britain
• Board meetings and senior executives will move to London in boost for capital 
• Decision follows lawsuit by climate activists to force Shell to slash emissions 

By RORY TINGLE, HOME AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT FOR MAILONLINE

PUBLISHED: 11:30, 15 November 2021 | UPDATED: 12:26, 15 November 2021

Oil giant Shell today announced it will move its headquarters and tax residence to the UK and drop ‘Royal Dutch’ from its name for the first time in 130 years.

The decision was hailed as a ‘clear vote of confidence in the British economy that will ‘create jobs’ by business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng. The firm pays hundreds of millions of pounds worth of taxes every year, which will now go to the Treasury. read more

The Washington Post

Shell wants to move headquarters amid cleaner energy shift

By Associated Press: Today at 6:58 a.m. EST LONDON — Royal Dutch Shell proposed moving its headquarters from the Netherlands to the United Kingdom and streamlining its structure Monday in hopes of making it easier to move forward in a world transitioning away from a dependence on fossil fuels.

The company, which has been incorporated in the U.K. with Dutch tax residency and dual class shares since 2005, said it wanted to move to a more conventional structure to be able to make the company more competitive as it seeks to meet the challenges of shifting toward cleaner energy.

Dutch officials said they were “unpleasantly surprised” by the move.

“The government deeply regrets that Shell wants to move its head office to the United Kingdom,” Dutch Economic Affairs and Climate Minister Stef Blok said. “We are in talks with the top of Shell about the implications of this move for jobs, critical investment decisions and sustainability.” read more

The New York Times

Shell Proposes Shift to Britain, Dropping ‘Royal Dutch’ From Name

The restructuring is meant to make the company more appealing to investors and make it easier to sell assets, the oil giant said.

By Stanley Reed: Nov. 15, 2021, 6:02 a.m. ET

Shell, Europe’s largest energy company, said Monday that it was proposing to move its headquarters to Britain from the Netherlands and make major changes in its share ownership and tax status.

The moves are designed to make the company, whose share price has lagged rivals, more appealing to investors, and they come less than a month after an activist investor, Daniel Loeb, suggested changes to the company’s structure. They are likely to be seen as a blow to the Netherlands, where Shell has an enormous presence, and a windfall for the British government as it struggles to demonstrate that Brexit can provide an economic boost. read more

London Evening Standard

Shell shares rise as FTSE 100 energy giant moves corporate HQ to London

Shift may reduce pressure over The Hague court ruling on emissions targets

By Simon Freeman: 15 November 2021

ROYAL DUTCH Shell will lose its regal title under proposals to tilt the FTSE 100 oil giant’s centre of gravity from the Netherlands to London. CEO Ben van Beurden (right), CFO Jessica Uhl and seven other senior executives will relocate to the capital full-time in what the £130 billion super-major called a “simplification” of its structure. read more

REUTERS

Shell’s Dutch exit comes with legal side benefits

15 Nov 2021: By George Hay

Shifting its tax residency to the UK, along with its head office and CEO, simplifies the $170 bln oil major’s structure. It also makes it easier to reorganise for the energy transition. The implied snub to the Dutch court which ordered Shell to cut emissions is an added bonus.

Royal Dutch Shell said on Nov. 15 it would seek shareholder approval to change its corporate structure in order to unify its two classes of shares. The company will also shift its tax residence to the United Kingdom.Shell is currently incorporated in the UK but has Dutch tax residence and a dual-class share structure. It adopted that approach in 2005 after combining Koninklijke Nederlandsche Petroleum Maatschappij and The Shell Transport and Trading Company under a single parent company.

Shell said a unified share structure would allow it to compete more effectively by allowing for an acceleration of share buybacks, as there will be a larger single pool of ordinary shares that can be bought back. read more

What impact will these changes have on the May 2021 District Court ruling?

The Simplification will have no impact on legal proceedings relating to the climate ruling issued by the District Court in The Hague in May 2021 or any other legal proceedings currently in progress.

The court ruled that the decision is immediately enforceable against Shell and should not be suspended pending an appeal. This applies regardless of our tax residence location.

We are rising to meet the challenge of the Dutch court’s ruling and have committed to reducing our Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 50% by 2030 on a net basis compared to our 2016 emissions. As we announced as part of our Q3 results, our 2022 business plan will reflect this new target, which we are committed to delivering regardless of whether we win or lose our appeal against the ruling. read more