Exxon Q2 profit up 18%
dallas — Rising oil prices pushed second-quarter profit at Exxon Mobil Corp up 18 per cent to $3.95 billion, but the results Friday fell short of Wall Street expectations, and the shares fell nearly three per cent.
The price of benchmark international crude is up more than 50 per cent from a year ago. But Exxon’s production of oil and natural gas slid seven per cent, so it didn’t fully take advantage of the higher prices.
Rival Chevron Corp, by contrast, boosted production two per cent and more than doubled its second-quarter profit from a year ago.
“The second quarter results were well below market expectations,” Neil Hansen, Exxon’s vice president of investor relations, acknowledged at the start of a call with analysts. He said the company was making progress with key investments that will pay off in the long term.
Exxon boosted its capital spending sharply — a reversal from the cutting that Exxon and other major oil companies did after the price collapse that started in 2014. It has major projects underway off the coast of South America, in Africa and Papua New Guinea.
Exxon’s second-quarter profit worked out to 92 cents per share. Analysts were looking for $1.26 per share, according to a survey by Zacks Investment Research. Exxon does not adjust results based on one-time events such as asset sales, which totaled $307 million in the quarter.
Revenue jumped 27 per cent to $73.50 billion, despite the decline in oil and gas output. The bright spots in Exxon’s portfolio included the Permian
Basin of Texas and the Bakken field in North Dakota, where production rose 30 per cent.
Capital spending climbed 69 per cent to $6.63 billion, with exploration and drilling rising notably in Brazil, the Permian Basin and Indonesia.