Total to slash spending on US shale and North Sea projects

The French oil major is to deeply cut investment in US shale and dramatically reduce North Sea field expansion in the UK as the oil price plunges, its CEO said at the Davos forum.

“We have fields on the US East Coast and my instructions have been pretty clear – we will limit investments,” Total CEO Patrick Pouyanne said at a panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. The head of the oil giant said he will return investments to those areas in one year when oil prices come back.

On Tuesday, Pouyanne told the Financial Times that Total will cut spending by 10 percent in 2015 and may even introduce a hiring freeze .... http://rt.com/business