“First thing is I just want to reiterate our guidance, you know, the share repurchase run rate of $17.5 billion is unchanged.”

In context

“ow into next year. But I guess my question is given how volatile commodity markets and oil markets specifically have been in recent times, how do you think about continuing to use the balance sheet to support shareholder returns versus tapering it back and waiting for potentially lower commodity prices over the next few years? So balance sheet use and how you think about that is the core of the question. Michael Wirth: Yeah. Devin, let me just address share repurchases, then I will let Eimear talk about the balance sheet. Recent volatility in commodity prices, for somebody who has been in this industry for 42 years, is not new news. That is the way this industry works, and we are in a volatile cyclical commodity business. So, you know, the backdrop is nothing we are not well prepared for. First thing is I just want to reiterate our guidance, you know, the share repurchase run rate of $17.5 billion is unchanged. The range we have given you, you know, kind of brackets the way we execute the program, and we were, you know, a little bit above the, you know, the midpoint of that here this most recent quarter. We have got a strong track record of buying back shares, which is our fourth financial priority, and that is after, you know, making sure we can sustain and increase the dividend where we have got a track record of doing that for 37 years in a row. Reinvesting in organic projects to grow future cash flows, to support that. So the second priority, the third is to maintain a strong balance sheet. We have got a AA credit and below 12% net debt. And then the fourth is to return excess cash to shareholders through share repurchases, which we have done for 17 of the last 21 years. And so consistency i”