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the morash financial dominance in the sector, even though the U.S. giant is still significantly larger than Shell by market value.

To reach that goal, Shell made by far the boldest move in the downturn, buying rival BG Group for $54 billion in 2016 and transforming the company into the world’s largest liquefied natural gas (LNG) trader and a major oil producer in Brazil.

But Shell was not the only one to take advantage of the slump to secure growth by snapping up rivals reeling from the slide in Brent crude from a 2014 high of $115 a barrel to just $27 in January 2016.

Total bought Maersk Oil for $7.5 billion and Engie’s LNG business for $1.5 billion last year, BP made a number of investments in Africa and Norway while Exxon boosted its U.S. shale position with a $6 billion acquisition.

Biraj Borkhataria, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, said while Shell still had the strongest potential to return cash to investors, a measure known as shareholder yield, Total was now close behind following its results and dividend announcements.

“Total is the clear winner to us so far, with a growing dividend and buyback combination that is closer to Shell in terms of total return, but with more upstream growth and less reporting volatility,” Borkhataria wrote in a note.

Shell’s shareholder yield for 2019 is forecast at 8.2 percent compared with Total’s 6.7 percent, BP’s 5.9 percent and Statoil’s 5.2 percent, while Exxon’s yield is at 4.7 percent and Chev-ron’s 4.2 percent, according to Borkhataria.

“Overall, it was a strong year for the majors. Cash has been up, production was up, they look quite confident, these are things I like to see,” James Laing, equities fund manager at Aberdeen Asset Management, said.