Exxon Mobil sets a profit record
January 31, 2006
By Joe Carroll
Chicago - Fourth-quarter profit at Exxon Mobil rose 27 percent on surging energy prices to a record $10.7 billion (R64.2 billion), the world's top oil firm said yesterday, capping the most profitable year for any company in US history.
Net income rose to $1.71 a share from $8.42 billion, or $1.44 a share, a year earlier, the company said. Excluding a gain from a lawsuit, profit was $1.65 a share, 21c higher than the average estimate from 22 analysts in a Thomson Financial survey.
Revenue rose 20 percent to $99.7 billion as rising demand and hurricanes lifted prices for crude oil, natural gas and petrol. The average US profit on refining crude into petrol and other fuels widened to a record of almost $11 a barrel processed, based on futures prices.
"Exxon is the most efficient operator in a market characterised by rampant demand and lagging supply growth," said Derek Vogler, a fund manager at Country Trust Bank.
Former chief executive Lee Raymond, who was succeeded on January 1 by Rex Tillerson, capitalised on high energy prices by boosting output in Russia, Angola and Malaysia.
Doug Leggate, an analyst at Citigroup in New York, said the firm also raised fuel production by expanding the world's biggest complement of refineries.
Crude oil futures in the US averaged $60.05 a barrel (R2.27 a litre) during the fourth quarter, a 24 percent rise from a year earlier.
Exxon Mobil is the last of the major US oil producers to report fourth-quarter earnings.Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Marathon Oil and Amerada Hess reported increased profit last week.
Vogler said Exxon Mobil and rival oil producers, such as BP and Chevron, were exploring more remote areas of the globe and drilling wells to record depths to bolster production as older fields in North America and the North Sea neared exhaustion.
The firm this year will tap new oilfields holding an estimated 1.75 billion barrels, or 34 percent, of all the new projects by publicly traded oil firms scheduled for 2005, according to analysts at Deutsche Bank.
- Bloomberg
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