History
Occidental was founded in 1920. In 1957, Dr. Armand Hammer was elected president and CEO. In 1961, the company discovered the Lathrop Gas Field in the Arbuckle area of the Sacramento basin at Lathrop. Over the next 10 years, Occidental expanded internationally with operations in Libya, Peru, Venezuela, Bolivia, Trinidad, and the United Kingdom. Occidental won exploration rights in Libya in 1965 and operated there until all activities were suspended in 1986 after the United States imposed economic sanctions on Libya. On July 6, 1988, an explosion and subsequent inferno on the Piper Alpha platform, operated by Occidental Petroleum (Caledonia) Ltd in the Scottish North Sea, resulted in 167 fatalities in what remains the world's most deadly offshore disaster.
Occidental entered the chemical business with the acquisition of Hooker Chemicals in 1968, 26 years after the contamination at Love Canal. Today, Dallas-based Occidental Chemical is a leading chemical manufacturer with interests in basic chemicals, vinyls and performance chemical products.
In 1990, Dr. Ray R. Irani became Occidental Petroleum Corporation's Chairman and CEO. He held the additional title of President from 2005 to 2007. Occidental Petroelum’s compensation policies came under scrutiny in 2007 after it was announced that CEO Ray Irani collected $460 million in stock shares and salary in 2006. In May 2011, Irani retired as CEO after the California State Teachers' Retirement System and Relational Investors, two major institutional Occidental Investors, objected to the company's compensation policies for top executives. President Stephen Chazen was named CEO of Occidental to replace Irani, who plans to stay on as executive Chairman until 2014. Since 1990, Occidental has gone from a collection of unrelated businesses to one that focuses on oil and gas. During Irani's tenure as CEO, Occidental’s market capitalization increased to more than $80 billion from $5.4 billion.
In 2005, Occidental was among 53 entities which contributed the maximum of $250,000 to the second inauguration of President George W. Bush. In 2008, Oxy contributed $301,579 to Democratic candidates and $204,587 to Republican candidates.
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