UPDATE 1-Chevron to outline 2009 capex in Jan, seen steady

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SAN FRANCISCO, Dec 1 (Reuters) - Chevron Corp (CVX.N) said on Monday it would announce its capital spending program at the end of January, instead of this month, because market conditions had changed "significantly."

The company is reexamining its business plans in light of changes in the business environment, though it still expects capital expenditure to be steady compared with 2008, spokesman Mickey Driver said in a statement, confirming the outlook Chevron gave at the end of October.

Capital spending budgets have been slashed across the oil and gas industry as the price of a barrel of crude CLc1 has plunged to trade at about a third of its $147 peak in July.

Chevron made $15.8 billion in capital and exploratory expenditures in the first nine months of 2008, out of a $22.9 billion program unveiled last December by the San Ramon, California-based company.

Shares of Chevron dropped nearly 9 percent on Monday, in line with a plummeting U.S. stock market as well as the rest of the energy sector, which was responding to an OPEC deferral on cutting crude oil production. [ID:nN01520663] (Reporting by Braden Reddall in San Francisco and Anna Driver in Houston; editing by Richard Chang)