When the Chairman Falls: BP's Week

BP's board fired Albert Manifold on Tuesday after colleagues described him as "shouty." The Irish executive had lasted seven months as chairman. BP shares fell by about 5% after the announcement , erasing roughly $4 billion in market value in a single session. The official reason: serious concerns over governance standards, oversight and conduct, with bullying and overbearing behaviour among the issues , according to the BBC's reporting.

But the real story isn't about one man's management style. Manifold had been brought in to help steer BP away from renewable energy and back toward oil and gas, and the company recently reported a doubling of profit to $3.2 billion for the January-to-March period, helped by stronger oil trading performance during the Iran war . The board got what it wanted -- a pivot back to hydrocarbons and a profit surge -- then removed the person executing it. BP has had three chief executive officers in as many years , Bloomberg noted. The pattern suggests something more fundamental than personnel problems.

Can National Oil Companies Outlast the Majors?

While BP stumbles through its third leadership crisis in as many years, a quieter shift is reshaping the global energy map. National oil companies already produce 54 percent of global oil and 50 percent of gas in 2025, and their combined share is projected to rise to around 62 percent by 2050 , according to a new report from the Natural Resource Governance Institute. More striking: in 2025, NOC capital expenditure ($240 billion) was more than three times that of the oil majors ($73 billion), and well over a trillion dollars of new investment is expected before 2033 .

The divergence is strategic, not just financial. National oil companies are increasingly setting the pace in global energy investment, outspending majors, locking up long-life assets, and taking control of future supply, while listed oil companies face tighter capital discipline and shareholder constraints , according to analysis from OilPrice.com. BP's governance chaos this week illustrates the constraint: Western majors answer to activist investors, quarterly earnings calls, and ESG scorecards. Saudi Aramco answers to Riyadh.

The Financial Times warned in an editorial that today's windfall is a warning for state oil companies -- continuing to invest as if yesterday's assumptions will govern tomorrow's world means they won't be around in 40 years . Yet the data suggests NOCs are betting the opposite way. NOCs will likely invest $1.8 trillion in upstream oil and gas developments over the next 10 years, but $425 billion -- a quarter of planned investment -- will be unprofitable if oil demand falls in line with the International Energy Agency's Announced Pledges Scenario, and this high-risk portion has doubled since the Russian invasion of Ukraine , the Natural Resource Governance Institute found.

BP, meanwhile, can't even keep a chairman for a year.

What Happens When You Have No Reserves?

Despite depending on supplies through the Strait of Hormuz for up to 90% of its oil and liquefied natural gas imports, Pakistan has no strategic petroleum reserves , Reuters reported this week. The Hormuz crisis has left Islamabad scrambling. According to a document reviewed by Reuters, the energy ministry is proposing to build strategic petroleum reserves as well as commercial storage through bonded terminals, refineries and oil marketing companies, and is also pushing for more oil and gas exploration and production .

The plan is ambitious. The build-up of government strategic reserves would be paid for by a ring-fenced fund financed by 10 rupees per litre from the existing levy on petroleum, with allocations to start on July 1, and that allocation would generate about $700 million a year , the document states. Pakistan shared the framework with Saudi Aramco, ADNOC, QatarEnergy, PetroChina, Vitol, and Trafigura. Most declined to comment or didn't respond.

Petroleum Minister Ali Pervaiz Malik said last week that building reserves was "easier said than done", especially for a country in an IMF programme with severe fiscal challenges , but added the government was trying to move quickly. The contradiction is stark: Pakistan needs reserves precisely because it's vulnerable, but it's too broke to afford them. The Hormuz blockade has made the cost of inaction impossible to ignore. Japan gets about 70% of its Middle Eastern oil delivered by ships that pass through the Strait of Hormuz . It has reserves. Pakistan has none.

The Gas Market's Split Personality

U.S. natural gas told two different stories this week. Daily natural gas prices powered up on Tuesday amid forecasts for an average but fulsome start to summer heat and expectations for rising LNG demand , Natural Gas Intelligence reported. According to market data, Henry Hub natural gas traded at $3.25/MMBtu on Tuesday, down 2.4% from Monday but still elevated compared to recent weeks.

The divergence between domestic and international prices remains wide. Global LNG prices remain elevated as a result of reduced flows through the Strait of Hormuz, with a wide spread between U.S. domestic natural gas prices and international markets , the EIA noted in its latest Short-Term Energy Outlook. The EIA expects the Henry Hub price to average about $3.50/MMBtu in 2026 and $3.18/MMBtu in 2027 .

The U.S. is adding LNG export capacity at a breakneck pace. In April, liquefied natural gas terminal operators in the United States added approximately 0.9 Bcf/d of export capacity, with Golden Pass LNG exporting its first cargo from Train 1 on April 22, adding approximately 0.7 Bcf/d of export capacity and becoming the ninth operational U.S. LNG export terminal . That's new supply hitting the market just as Europe and Asia scramble for alternatives to Middle Eastern gas.

SoftBank is betting big on the infrastructure boom. On May 26, 2026, SoftBank Group announced that it has engaged several major banks for the upcoming U.S. IPO of its energy and infrastructure subsidiary, SB Energy, and the IPO could target a valuation exceeding $50 billion and may be launched as soon as September , according to sources familiar with the matter. SB Energy, a SoftBank-backed energy and infrastructure developer focused on pairing power generation with data centers to help address AI's growing energy constraints, is partnering with OpenAI and SoftBank on the $500 billion Stargate initiative and said last week it plans to confidentially submit a draft registration statement for an IPO .

The AI data center boom is colliding with the energy crisis in real time. Natural gas isn't just a heating fuel anymore -- it's the bridge fuel for the computing revolution.

The EV Milestone No One Noticed

Buried in the week's energy headlines: global electric car sales topped 20 million worldwide in 2025, and more than one in four cars sold in 2025 is expected to be electric , the IEA reported. Building on strong sales in the first quarter of 2025, China is expected to sell over 14 million electric cars across the full year -- more than were sold globally in 2023 .

The numbers are staggering, but the implications are more so. About 5% of the global car stock is now electrified, displacing 1.2 million barrels of oil per day in 2025 . That's roughly equivalent to the entire oil production of Qatar. And it's accelerating. The IEA projects the global EV fleet could reach 510 million vehicles by 2035, even without new policy announcements.

For context: BP's profit doubled this quarter on oil trading. Pakistan is building reserves it can't afford. National oil companies are pouring $240 billion a year into long-cycle projects. And the transportation sector -- which consumes roughly 60% of global oil -- is quietly electrifying at a pace that would have seemed impossible five years ago.

What Changed This Week

BP's board proved that even a doubled profit and a successful strategic pivot won't save you if the culture turns toxic. Pakistan's reserve plan exposed how the Hormuz crisis is forcing energy-importing nations to confront vulnerabilities they've ignored for decades. SoftBank's SB Energy IPO signaled that Wall Street sees the AI-energy nexus as a multi-decade infrastructure play, not a cyclical bet. And the IEA's 20 million EV sales figure confirmed that the energy transition isn't a future event -- it's a present-tense restructuring of global demand.

What to Watch

BP begins its search for a permanent chairman, with interim chair Ian Tyler promising continuity on strategy. The real question is whether any Western major can execute a long-term oil and gas strategy while navigating ESG pressures and activist investors. Pakistan's reserve framework goes to potential partners in June; watch whether any major NOC or trader commits capital to a country with severe fiscal constraints. SB Energy's IPO filing is expected in the coming weeks, with a September debut possible. And the IEA's next Global EV Outlook update, due in late 2026, will reveal whether the 20 million sales figure was a peak or a plateau.