Why ExxonMobil is paying $60bn for Pioneer

AMERICA’S SHALE patch is a testament to bottom-up capitalist enterprise. It was conquered by wildcat frackers, who came up with clever ways of horizontal drilling and releasing oil trapped in the rock formations. Independent shale specialists such as Devon Energy, EOG Resources and Pioneer Natural Resources became some of the country’s biggest oil producers, helping to boost domestic output from 8m barrels per day in 2005 to 15m in 2015—and to turn America from a net importer of oil into an exporter. Oil giants such as ExxonMobil and Chevron trod more gingerly into shalelands such as the Permian basin, not least because the wildcatters’ expansionary zeal earned fracking a reputation for torching billions of investors’ money.