On this day, 27 years ago, December 1, 1998 (October 13, 1998, the lunar calendar), Exxon purchased Mobil Corporation with a large amount of money. On December 1, 1998, Exxon Oil acquired Mobil Oil Company for US$77.2 billion. On December 1, 1998, Exxon, the leader of the U.S. oil industry, invested US$76.6 billion to purchase Mobil, the second child. This is the largest corporate merger in the world to date. It far exceeds the size of BP's planned $57.1 billion purchase of Amoco, and dwarfs the sensational $72.6 billion acquisition of Travelers Group by Citibank. After the marriage, ExxonMobil became the world's largest company in terms of annual sales, taking away Royal Dutch Shell as the world's largest energy company, and taking away General Motors as the world's largest industrial company. This new oil empire has 48500 gas stations around the world and operates various businesses such as oil exploration, production and processing worldwide, with a daily crude oil production capacity of up to 1.6 million barrels. The two companies have a total of 120,000 employees. In 1997, their combined sales reached US$202.3 billion, and their combined profits were approximately US$11.8 billion. There are two main reasons cited for Exxon's acquisition of Mobil: First, in recent years, global oil production has been overproduced, consumption has been sluggish, oil prices have fallen, and the market situation has been severe. The second is to reduce costs, improve efficiency, and further enhance our advantages in international competition. According to the head of ExxonMobil, the new merged company will save $2.8 billion in annual expenses; it will reduce its employees by 9000, accounting for about 7% of its total employees. In the first year after the merger, the company's profits will remain at the original level, and the company's operating conditions will be greatly improved in the second year. Exxon's predecessor was Standard Oil of New Jersey, and Mobil's predecessor was Standard Oil of New York. They are each one of the "seven sisters" of the Rockefeller Oil Empire. In 1911, the U.S. government divided the Rockefeller Petroleum Group into seven for antitrust considerations. Now that Exxon and Mobil are reuniting, antitrust issues are naturally of concern. The chairman of the Senate Antimonopoly Committee called the marriage "worrying." The merger of Exxon and Mobil still needs to be reviewed and approved by the government, but it is expected that it will not encounter much resistance, because the Clinton administration has relaxed restrictions on domestic companies under antitrust laws in recent years and encouraged companies to merge to form more A large company with global competitiveness. In fact, the wave of mergers that have emerged in the United States in recent years is a product of this policy. Exxon Chairman Raymond (left) and Mobil Chairman Noto at a press conference