Ex-Andersen Tax man appointed Director in oil group

Source: OilVoice.com

Kam Fard, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Groundstar Resources Limited announces the appointment of John van der Welle to the Board of Directors of the Company.

Mr. van der Welle has been actively involved in the oil industry for twenty-five years. He began his career in auditing and oil tax consultancy with Arthur Andersen LLP. In 1984 he joined Enterprise Oil plc, the largest independent exploration and development company in the U.K., where he rose to the position of Group Treasurer. Mr. van der Welle later served as Finance Director of Hardy Oil and Gas plc and Premier Oil plc. In addition, he has served as Chief Financial Officer and Director of First Calgary Petroleums Limited and as Head of Oil and Gas in the Sector Corporate Finance Group for the Royal Bank of Scotland. Most recently, he has joined Stratic Energy Corporation as Chief Financial Officer and Director.

Throughout his career Mr. van der Welle has had extensive experience in many corporate areas of business including business development and planning, investor relations, corporate governance, rebuilding management teams, and banking and finance. He has been involved in major business transactions including mergers, acquisitions, and major financings and restructurings of large public companies.

Mr. van der Welle graduated in Engineering from Southampton University and is a qualified Chartered Accountant. He is also a member of the Chartered Institute of Taxation and the Association of Corporate Treasurers.

Upon announcing his appointment Mr. Fard said, "We at Groundstar are extremely pleased that a person of Mr. van der Welle's stature and experience has joined our Board. Not only has he proved that he is a dynamic and successful leader in the oil industry, he brings to the table a wealth of knowledge in respect of the corporate finance and the international aspects of the business. He will undoubtedly prove to be a great asset in the growth and success of Groundstar in the years ahead."

BP uses internal tax faculty as recruitment tool

I only became aware recently that BP had set up an internal tax faculty to help with both attracting new talent into their tax team, and for longer term retention of people. The BP tax team is very large, with something like 150 in-house tax staff, so I guess having a dedicated tax faulty within the company can be easily justified.

Their Corporate Tax Director, John Bartlett, initiated this 2 years ago. Like most large corporates, they were struggling to recruit high calibre tax professionals from the external market. "The tax recruitment market had evolved and we could no longer rely on the professional firms and Revenues releasing a stream of talented individuals into industry," Bartlett said.

The tax faculty is based within BP's already established virtual university. Here tax professionals can develop their skills from classroom-based courses, self-led modules and on-the-job training.

"The financial reward package is always important but in an increasingly transparent market, it can be a given with candidates already knowing the salaries that are generally available," Bartlett says. "Now candidates want to know where the job might lead, the variety of progression opportunities and what track record the company can demonstrate of realising them for its people."

BP's programme offers career development frameworks that will seek to motivate and develop a tax professional comparable to that of practice Bartlett explains.

To date, the programme has been a roaring success, one that Bartlett describes as 'very powerful' in attracting and retaining tax staff all over the world especially lesser known tax networks including Russia, Vietnam, Korea, Azerbaijan and Indonesia.

From past experience, I know that BP have never really had a problem with retaining tax staff. Because of the massive size and scale of the global group, they have been able to offer tax professionals a career progression plan, including secondments to other parts of finance and overseas placements, which is always an effective retention tool. However BP's method is easy to replicate and other multinationals such as Shell and GE have also established their own tailored versions.

The above quotes come from the article "The tax talent pool is diminishing" by Jo Faith in the April 2008 issue of International Tax Review (www.internationaltaxreview.com)

Senior In-House Tax Appointments in the US

Source: Tax Careers Magazine

At Marathon Oil, Stephen Landry replaced tax veteran William Meara as tax VP. Landry, who was director of tax, compliance and reporting for Marathon, succeeded Meara on 1 January 2008. Landry joined Marathon in January 2007. Previously, he spent 22 years with Ernst & Young. He became tax partner for E&Y in 1998 and transferred to the Houston energy practice in 2000.

Viacom has appointed Jay Kushner to a newly-created role as senior vice-president of global taxation and treasury. He will report to Thomas Dooley, CFO of Viacom. Kushner joined Viacom in June 2005 as the company's vice-president and general tax counsel. Before joining Viacom, he was treasurer and general tax counsel at Young & Rubicam, a global advertising agency and marketing services company. Prior to that he led the international tax operations at PepsiCo and was an executive with Coopers & Lybrand.


SG comment: Whilst the general perception is that tax skills are easily transferable between different sectors, I think the above two appointments show that perhaps the very top tax jobs will be taken by tax execs who have deep understanding and experience of a company's sector.

BP settles tax in Alaska

Source: Financial Times

BP has agreed to pay Alaska $379m (£191m) to settle a dispute over its corporate income tax liabilities for 2000-02, the US state's governor announced late on New Year's Eve.

Sarah Palin said BP, Europe's second largest oil company, had agreed on December 31 to pay the money. The funds would be deposited in the constitutional budget reserve, the state's main savings account.

The terms and conditions of the dispute and agreement must be kept confidential by law, she added. "I am very pleased with this settlement and appreciate BP's willingness to work with the state of Alaska and come to a fair resolution."

BP confirmed the details of the settlement and said it was glad the matter was resolved.

The payment, on behalf of the BP Exploration (Alaska) subsidiary, is the latest blow to BP which is still under investigation by state officials for last year's oil spill in Prudhoe Bay for which the company has already paid $20m in fines.

Just before Christmas, Ms Palin signed into law a proposed tax increase on the oil industry, boosting the rate from 22.5 per cent to 25 per cent of the net value of oil.

The increase, which is expected to raise the industry's tax bill by $1.5bn next year, led BP to say it was reviewing its investment plans in Alaska.

Doug Suttles, president of BP Exploration (Alaska), said he was disappointed by the tax hike. "This will impact our business plans in 2008."

On December 26, an Alaska superior court judge ruled that BP, ExxonMobil and other oil companies could have their leases for Point Thomson, a gas and condensate field, revoked by the state because they had taken too long to develop it.

The ruling was welcomed by Ms Palin.