N.Y. Probes Exxon’s Valuation of Oil Reserves

By Erik Larson and Meenal Vamburkar, Bloomberg News

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman’s probe into Exxon Mobil Corp. includes scrutiny of why it didn’t write down the value of oil fields during a global collapse in prices that prompted billions in write-offs by rival drillers, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The avenue of inquiry is related to larger questions of whether Exxon knew decades ago about the dangers of climate change and failed to alert investors to the financial risks it could pose to the world’s biggest oil explorer by market value, said the person, ...