Chevron Reports Loss of $588m in Q4
As the drop in the prices of crude oil erodes the earnings and profits of companies, Chevron Corporation at the weekend reported a loss of $588 million for fourth quarter 2015, compared with earnings of $3.5 billion in the 2014 fourth quarter.
According to the financial results, foreign currency effects increased earnings in the 2015 quarter by $46 million, compared with an increase of $432 million a year earlier.
Full-year 2015 earnings were $4.6 billion compared with $19.2 billion in 2014.
Sales and other operating revenues in fourth quarter 2015 were $28 billion, compared to $42 billion in the year-ago period.
“Our 2015 earnings were down significantly from the previous year, reflecting a nearly 50 percent year-on-year decline in crude oil prices,” said Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Mr. John Watson.
“We are taking significant action to improve earnings and cash flow in this low price environment. Operating expenses and capital spending were reduced $9 billion in 2015 from 2014, and I expect similarly large reductions again in 2016. In addition, asset sales proceeds were $6 billion in 2015, with additional sales planned for 2016 and 2017,” Watson said.
“Improved refinery reliability allowed us to capture the benefits of a favorable margin environment and post excellent downstream results for the year. We continued to reshape the downstream portfolio with well-timed asset sales and good progress on petrochemical investments,” Watson added.
“We advanced our upstream major capital projects. We had first production from two deepwater projects in Africa, and ramped up production from Jack/St. Malo in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico and our shale and tight resources in the Permian Basin. We made significant progress on our LNG projects in Australia, in particular the Gorgon Project where we expect to be producing LNG within the next few weeks. Successful completion and start-up of these and other major capital projects will translate into significantly lower capital spending, higher production and growing cash generation in the months ahead,” Watson explained.