Exxon Profit and Revenue Slide Again

Exxon Mobil Corp. said its quarterly profit dropped 60% and its top and bottom lines came in worse than expected as the oil giant remains racked by low energy prices.

Shares slipped 2.7% premarket to $87.80 as the company reported its seventh straight quarter of year-over-year profit declines and its eighth straight quarter of falling revenue, according to FactSet data.

Chief Executive Rex Tillerson said the results "reflect a volatile industry environment" and that the company "remains focused on business fundamentals, cost discipline and advancing selective new investments."

For the June quarter, Exxon, the largest U.S. oil company, reported a profit of $1.7 billion, or 41 cents a share, down from $4.19 billion, or $1 a share, a year earlier. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters were looking for 64 cents a share.

Revenue dropped 22% to $57.69 billion, below analysts' forecast for $60.64 billion.

Profit in the exploration and production, or upstream, business fell $1.7 billion to $294 million. In the U.S., the upstream division widened its loss to $514 million from $47 million a year earlier.

Exxon also was hurt by declining profit in the downstream division, which had previously been a boon amid lower prices for oil and gas. In the latest quarter, refining and marketing, or downstream, earnings were $825 million, $681 million lower than in the year-earlier period. Exxon said weaker margins decreased earnings by $850 million while volume and mix effects increased earnings by $130 million.

Exxon slashed its capital and explorations spending 38% from a year ago $5.16 billion.

Oil companies around the world have been battered by a price crash that has left crude and natural gas stubbornly low. Producing countries such as Saudi Arabia and major international oil companies like Chevron have all continued to pump more fuel in the face of the crisis—a standoff that shows no signs of abating.

Write to Anne Steele at [e-mail]

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 29, 2016 08:55 ET (12:55 GMT)

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