Berkshire Buys OxyChem; FICO Upsets Credit Bureaus.

Deal: Berkshire to buy OxyChem from Occidental

In a definitive transaction announced this week, Berkshire Hathaway will acquire Occidental Petroleum’s OxyChem chemicals business for $9.7 billion in cash. Occidental said it intends to use about $6.5 billion of the proceeds to drive its net debt below $15 billion, and the companies expect the sale to close in the fourth quarter. The deal is straightforward: a cash buyer, a clear deleveraging plan and a specific timetable.

Deal terms & timing

The headline figures are simple and material: $9.7 billion purchase price and a stated $6.5 billion allocation to cut Occidental’s leverage. Management expects the transaction to wrap up in Q4, which gives investors a defined event window for balance‑sheet improvement at Occidental and potential capital redeployment.

Index and sector implications

Because OxyChem sits inside a larger industrial and energy ecosystem, the sale has immediate, tangible implications for S&P 500 and Dow‑linked investors who track energy and industrial flows. The transaction reduces Occidental’s leverage risk and could change investor expectations about future buybacks, dividends or M&A capacity — all items that can move sentiment among energy peers and related index constituents.

Corporate tech shift: FICO’s direct licensing for mortgage scores

Separately, FICO announced a new direct‑licensing approach that allows mortgage tri‑merge resellers and other vendors to calculate and distribute FICO scores without routing them through the three major credit bureaus. That product change is not theoretical: it alters the distribution chain for one of the most widely used credit metrics in lending.

What changed and why it matters

Historically, mortgage tri‑merge reports — which combine data from multiple credit bureaus — were the standard path for mortgage underwriting and score delivery. FICO’s direct option gives originators and vendors a way to source the score itself, potentially reducing the role or margin of intermediate bureau resellers. Market reaction was immediate: FICO’s shares rose while Equifax, TransUnion and Experian saw selling pressure on concerns about future revenue mix and margin compression.

Broader investor takeaways

Both stories are concrete corporate actions with short timelines and measurable consequences, rather than speculative rumors. The Berkshire‑OxyChem deal is a classic balance‑sheet event: cash in, debt down, clearer capital allocation for Occidental. FICO’s licensing shift is a distribution and competitive event that could reshape revenue channels for credit bureaus and vendors.

For index‑focused investors tracking S&P 500, Nasdaq and Dow components, these are the kinds of items that can move sector leadership and reweight flows in the days around the announced timelines. Energy and industrial ETFs may react to the debt‑reduction news at Occidental; financials and data/analytics names linked to credit distribution should be watched as FICO’s model gets adopted or challenged.

If you’d like, I can turn these into a short watchlist with tickers, estimated index weights and suggested trigger points to monitor ahead of the Q4 close and near‑term adoption metrics for FICO’s new licensing product.