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The Players: Multinationals and National Oil Companies (NOCs) Multinationals are international, for-profit companies that explore for and produce oil, refine it into gasoline, and sell it to consumers. These include ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, ConocoPhillips, and ChevronTexaco. Once called “Big Oil,” that name is now a misnomer since multinationals account for around 15% of the world’s current production and less than 10% of the reserves. The combined names are also a telling indication of the consolidation these companies underwent to stay in business during the 1990s when margins were small or negative. Of course the multinationals are still massive relative to other NYSE publicly-held companies; however, they are no longer the only major players in the oil supply market, and their power is diminishing. The roles of multinationals are increasingly those of contractors, service providers, and commodity suppliers. Often they compete to supply technical and management skills to the national oil companies. The national oil companies (NOCs) are owned and controlled in varying measures by the governments of their countries: Saudi Arabia, Iran, Nigeria, etc. The increased oil wealth of these countries raises the stakes of all diplomacy, the war in Iraq as the most extreme example. Other such countries are Russia and Iran. The incentives of national oil companies are a mix of national politics with efficient oil production, leading to limits on partners and customers (Venezuela), limits on efficiency (Pemex), balancing of international, national and regional Middle Eastern political interests (Saudi Arabia), and civil strife (Nigeria). These political incentives are not necessarily aligned with US consumer interest in obtaining inexpensive gasoline. 
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