bp
Five priorities, From August 2026
In three words: focus, perform, grow
Five priorities
bp made $24.5 billion of operating cash flow in 2025 and ended the year with $22.2 billion of net debt. In February 2025 it reset its strategy to grow the upstream, focus the downstream, and invest with discipline in the transition. In August 2026 its new chief executive, Meg O’Neill, set out five priorities to deliver a step change in performance, starting with a stronger balance sheet, which now takes all of bp’s excess cash.
Strengthening the balance sheet
- 1Net debtBring net debt down to $14–18 billion by the end of 2027.
- 2Excess cashPut all excess cash into the balance sheet, with the share buyback suspended.
- 3Wider liabilitiesKeep cutting the total of net debt, hybrid bonds, leases, and Gulf of America settlement liabilities, which bp says is still not low enough.
4 August 2026Net debt was $22.3 billion at the end of June 2026, down from $25.3 billion at the end of March.
4 August 2026The total of net debt, hybrids, leases, and settlement liabilities fell by $6.9 billion in the second quarter, more than 11%.
4 August 2026bp redeemed a $2.9 billion perpetual hybrid bond in the quarter.
Draw 1 of 5
bp aims to cut net debt to $14–18 billion by the end of 2027
The board suspended the share buyback early in 2026 so that all excess cash goes to the balance sheet, and bp expects about $6 billion from selling 65% of Castrol by the end of 2026.,
$22.3bn
net debt at the end of June 2026
The marks up the bow are billions of dollars of net debt; the ship sits to the mark for the chosen quarter.
bp has a $20 billion programme of sales
It announced or completed more than $11 billion of sales in the programme’s first year, and expects $8–9 billion of proceeds in 2026, about $6 billion of it from Castrol.,
North Sea
bp’s business in the UK North Sea
Put up for sale in July 2026
Archaea Energy
Its biogas business in the US
Put up for sale in August 2026
Say what went wrong before the fix.
bp’s new chief executive opened her priorities with a plain account: its performance had not met its own expectations, it had not delivered consistently, it had written off too much value, and its costs were not resilient enough. We recommend that a new plan starts by naming what the last one did not do, so that each priority reads as the answer to a problem everyone has seen.
Say what pauses to pay for the first priority.
bp put the balance sheet first and suspended its share buyback so that all excess cash goes to cutting debt. We recommend that when one priority comes before the others, the plan names what stops or waits to fund it, so that nobody has to guess what “first” means.
Judge every part of the business on what it earns now.
bp says it will simplify its portfolio on value, not sentiment nor history, and it is selling a majority of Castrol, a German refinery, and its UK North Sea business. We recommend listing every part of a business by the value it creates today, and being ready to part with ones that matter to the company’s story.
Sources
- 1. BP p.l.c. (2026). bp Annual Report and Form 20-F 2025. Annual report, 6 March 2026. sec.gov
- 2. BP p.l.c. (2026). Group results, second quarter and first half 2026. Results statement, 4 August 2026. investegate.co.uk
Headwater is not connected with BP p.l.c. bp, Castrol, bp pulse, and Archaea are trade marks of their owners. Updated 5 October 2026.