Exxon shatters profit records

blackredyellow

Figured I'd post this, I'm sure it would have gotten here eventually....


Exxon shatters profit records
Oil giant makes corporate history by booking $11.7 billion in quarterly profit; earns $1,300 a second in 2007.
February 1 2008: 9:01 AM EST

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Exxon Mobil made history on Friday by reporting the highest quarterly and annual profits ever for a U.S. company.

Exxon (XOM, Fortune 500) shares gained nearly 2% in pre-market trading on the results, which were underpinned by soaring crude prices.

Exxon, the world's largest publicly traded oil company, said fourth-quarter net income rose 14% to $11.66 billion, or $2.13 per share. That's up from $10.25 billion, or $1.76 per share, in the year-ago period.

That tops Exxon's previous quarterly profit record of $10.7 billion, set in the fourth quarter of 2005, which also was a record for any U.S. corporation.

Exxon also set an annual profit record by earning $40.61 billion last year, or nearly $1,300 per second.

The company's full-year results exceeded its previous record of $39.5 billion in 2006.

In the fourth quarter, revenue rose 29.5% from a year ago to $116.64 billion.

Analysts were looking for the company to report quarterly profit of $10.36 billion on revenue of $114.9 billion, according to earnings tracker Thomson Financial.

Exxon's earnings are sure to draw fire from consumer rights groups, who contend the oil industry is deliberately restricting supply and profiting on the back of U.S. motorists. They have previously called for a windfall profit tax on oil firms, and have proposed breaking up the big oil companies created during the 1990s merger wave.

Exxon attributed its impressive results to strong performance across its divisions, but a large part of the surge in profit can be attributed to soaring oil prices.

Last year, crude prices skyrocketed nearly 60%. That surge helped prices break through the $100 a barrel mark for the first time ever early last month.

Natural gas prices have also increased compared to last year, albeit marginally.

But costs have also increased for the oil companies, and they haven't been able to make as much selling gasoline, which is why profits haven't risen as rapidly as crude prices.

Exxon isn't the only oil giant to report impressive earnings. No. 2 Chevron (CVX, Fortune 500) also reported a jump in quarterly profit on Friday. Conoco (COP, Fortune 500), the nation's third largest oil company, trounced profit estimates by nearly 25% when it reported last week.

Find this article at:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/01/news/companies/exxon_earnings/index.htm?eref=rss_topstories

Pacomc79

what was the margin in relation to the previous year?

How much did they spend on research and development?

How do thier profits relate to most insurance profits?


I'm more upset with Oil Companies for not doing more research on bio fuels and getting those to the market quicker as well as not building newer more efficient refineries with more environmental protections but Environmental groups are owed plenty of the blame for that because they do all they can to block progress even in the face of better efficiency and refining of cheaper heavy crude.

USLD came out in the past year, once on road effiencent diesels come on the market in the US and people start using it gasoline prices will go down a bit and so will diesel after they pay for all the new infrastructure. There is far too high a demand for gasoline right now. It's our own fault.

The biggest problem is the high cost of sweet light crude the decades of wasted time not researching biofuels and not enough refineries in the US not to mention thier ancient age and lack of interest in reinvestment mainly due to the ridiculous governmental hoops you have to jump through to get things done.

polaris

blackredyellow wrote:

Exxon (XOM, Fortune 500) shares gained nearly 2% in pre-market trading on the results, which were underpinned by soaring crude prices.

Exxon attributed its impressive results to strong performance across its divisions, but a large part of the surge in profit can be attributed to soaring oil prices.

Last year, crude prices skyrocketed nearly 60%. That surge helped prices break through the $100 a barrel mark for the first time ever early last month.

it's funny when we talk about how this "war" benefits the oil companies - people always say it doesn't ... well, if this ain't proof - nothing is gonna convince peeps that this "war" was an imperialistic venture ...

send you troops to die, kill innocent civilians including children - all so your oil companies and defense contractors can make record profits ... all the while - your debt as a citizen of your country continues to mount ...

Pacomc79

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12519975/


They aren't producing enough gasoline for the market, but currently the business environment makes it better to deal with outdated horrible facilities rather than build newer better cleaner safer facilities. Unless there is a reason to spend money, Oil Companies... don't do it except for finding new oil deposits. Currently they have no reason to. They are spending billions in research finding new oil deposits but there aren't enough refineries or infrastructure resources to meet the demand adequately. That's why it's so expensive.

Kel Varnsen

Pacomc79 wrote:

what was the margin in relation to the previous year?

How much did they spend on research and development?

That is what always bugs me when people talk these "record profits" in that they don't talk about how much that number relates to the amount of money they spent. I mean for a super exaggerated example if your company only costs $1000 a year to run 11 billion in profit is amazing. But if your company costs 500 billion to run an 11 billion dollar profit really isn't that good. I mean if you read the article it says that that profit was made on 116 billion in revenue. That is only like a 9% profit. I am sure that there are other industries where they make way more than a 9% profit.

my2hands

whats new

jlew24asu

Kel Varnsen wrote:

That is what always bugs me when people talk these "record profits" in that they don't talk about how much that number relates to the amount of money they spent. I mean for a super exaggerated example if your company only costs $1000 a year to run 11 billion in profit is amazing. But if your company costs 500 billion to run an 11 billion dollar profit really isn't that good. I mean if you read the article it says that that profit was made on 116 billion in revenue. That is only like a 9% profit. I am sure that there are other industries where they make way more than a 9% profit.

well said and very true. exxon makes so much money based on sheer volume of sales. their profits margins are no where near the top. they just happen to sell something that almost everyone in the world needs.

jlew24asu

my2hands wrote:

whats new

by this i'm sure you are blame them for being a money hungry corporate giant that steals from the little guy.

do you drive a car?

Pacomc79

Kel Varnsen wrote:

That is what always bugs me when people talk these "record profits" in that they don't talk about how much that number relates to the amount of money they spent. I mean for a super exaggerated example if your company only costs $1000 a year to run 11 billion in profit is amazing. But if your company costs 500 billion to run an 11 billion dollar profit really isn't that good. I mean if you read the article it says that that profit was made on 116 billion in revenue. That is only like a 9% profit. I am sure that there are other industries where they make way more than a 9% profit.

Yeah it's about 8.5% or that's what they said in the MSNBC article.

I bet a few companies in northern New Jersey who make drugs did slightly better.... hell for that matter, I wonder what Vitamin Water did last year.

stupidcorporatewhore

Kel Varnsen wrote:

That is what always bugs me when people talk these "record profits" in that they don't talk about how much that number relates to the amount of money they spent. I mean for a super exaggerated example if your company only costs $1000 a year to run 11 billion in profit is amazing. But if your company costs 500 billion to run an 11 billion dollar profit really isn't that good. I mean if you read the article it says that that profit was made on 116 billion in revenue. That is only like a 9% profit. I am sure that there are other industries where they make way more than a 9% profit.

don't make or even plant the assumption that they are breaking the bank on R & D unless you can prove it.

find the figures on R & D and post em if your going to try to make a case for "poor, suffering FUCKTILLIONARES!!"

we haven't seen a new refinery built in 30 years. That should be a hint.

they won't come to their own defense so why should you?

Pacomc79

stupidcorporatewhore wrote:

don't make or even plant the assumption that they are breaking the bank on R & D unless you can prove it.

find the figures on R & D and post em if your going to try to make a case for "poor, suffering FUCKTILLIONARES!!"

we haven't seen a new refinery built in 30 years. That should be a hint.

they won't come to their own defense so why should you?

Exxon is a tremendously HUGE company they employ a tremendously Huge amount of people. I don't have the internal R&D numbers but I do know they have a research drill ship or two that cost about $500,000 dollars per day to operate and they do that pretty much non stop when and where they can.

They also are quite a bit of the money behind deep water Remote Operated Vehicle research so they don't have to put divers in harms way. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that's a Fuckload of money in research since they are trying to find reliable non war torn supply sources not controlled by opec as fast as they can.

Everyone at the top of Every large company and all board members make shit tons of money, they are also the assholes responsible for making the ridiculous corporate decisions that get all those people like us common folks laid off. Does it bother me that the guy at the top makes a ridiculous amount more than the majority of the people who do the most work? Yeah, but I can't do much about that at all.


We won't see a new refinery built because no one wants a new refinery built near where they live.

smg9779

I'm so happy for them

gabers

Pacomc79 wrote:

We won't see a new refinery built because no one wants a new refinery built near where they live.

Man, you'd think that somewhere in the rust belt, say Flint, Michigan, they'd jump at the chance to build a refinery in their backyards, even to the detriment of their own health. Where have the new refineries been proposed to be built?

polaris

i could make a crap load of money if i influenced gov't policy

Uncle Leo

I'm no fan, but any record breaking profits fall squarely on the shoulders of the consumer. Anyone here ride the bus? Bike or walk on two mile trips instead of drive. If you are driven by convenience and live an auto-dependant lifestyle, YOU are the reason for those profits. Or course gas prices are going to be high. The prices are inelastic--when the prices go up, demand does not go down that much.

We're the chumps.

Would you lower the price of your good if sales at high prices were through the roof? Out of the goodness of your heart? Exxon owes us nothing in terms of cheap gas. We owe it to ourselves. Now everyone get a bike and a bus pass. Don't ask what your community can do for you, ask what you can do for your community--make a sacrifice. If you use less gas, the price won't matter as much.

Pacomc79

gabers wrote:

Man, you'd think that somewhere in the rust belt, say Flint, Michigan, they'd jump at the chance to build a refinery in their backyards, even to the detriment of their own health. Where have the new refineries been proposed to be built?

http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=12227 these explain it a bit better.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4296812.stm


Essentially like all companies Oil Companies are cheap after all they are run by accountants right?

Refining dosen't make a whole heap of money... exploration does.... then add in the frustration of permits, zoning, environmental regulations bad PR etc.... you wind up with people going... ok screw it. We know we're produciong a hell of a lot less than we should but we're not going to get a huge return on the refinery we will with exploration... that leads to some of the horrible issues like the blow down drum explosion at BP but again, when you mainly look to accountants and not engineers these kinds of things happen then you tie in the.... well I like driving but I don't really want to have a big dangerous refinery near me.....even if it is more efficent than the last one built 30 years ago.

It's got to be easy to get the oil in and the product out though as well so location is kind of important as well as the infrastructure.

Basically what this means is the same thing it meant for US manufacturing. Taxes/penalties cost too much to build new refineries here with not much return. Farm it out to India/China Azerbajan other large oil producing countries etc....or just raise the price because there is no margin for error. Companies keep themselves as thin as possible it's just the nature of business.

Kel Varnsen

Pacomc79 wrote:

Exxon is a tremendously HUGE company they employ a tremendously Huge amount of people. I don't have the internal R&D numbers but I do know they have a research drill ship or two that cost about $500,000 dollars per day to operate and they do that pretty much non stop when and where they can.

They also are quite a bit of the money behind deep water Remote Operated Vehicle research so they don't have to put divers in harms way. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that's a Fuckload of money in research since they are trying to find reliable non war torn supply sources not controlled by opec as fast as they can.

Everyone at the top of Every large company and all board members make shit tons of money, they are also the assholes responsible for making the ridiculous corporate decisions that get all those people like us common folks laid off. Does it bother me that the guy at the top makes a ridiculous amount more than the majority of the people who do the most work? Yeah, but I can't do much about that at all.

Just to follow up on my previous post one of the biggest banks in Canada posted a record profit last year, check out this link:

http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2007/11/30/royalfourth.html

Except their profit was 1.32 billion on about 5.6 billion in revenue. Their profit percentage was closer to 18percent, about double what exxon made. So why do people only complain about the oil company profits? If you had a choice to spend about about 4 billion and make 1 billion dollars profit or spend about 100 billion and make 10 billion profit which would you choose?

As far as the top executives making tons of cash. It doesn't really bother me that much. I mean if you want the highly skilled people you have to pay for them. If you want whoever jackass you can get try cutting their salaries.

Number 18

My father-in-law designs drill bits for the drilling rigs for oil companies. Those things are not cheap either.

I used to bitch about oil companies recording record profits quarter after quarter. But, like mentioned already, I drive a car. So instead I got in on the profits by putting some oil stocks in my portfolio.

Pacomc79

Kel Varnsen wrote:

As far as the top executives making tons of cash. It doesn't really bother me that much. I mean if you want the highly skilled people you have to pay for them. If you want whoever jackass you can get try cutting their salaries.

that's the thing, if they make a bad decision, they can screw up the lives of thousands.... you kind of want to make sure you get the best... and the best is usually expensive.

polaris

Kel Varnsen wrote:

Just to follow up on my previous post one of the biggest banks in Canada posted a record profit last year, check out this link:

http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2007/11/30/royalfourth.html

Except their profit was 1.32 billion on about 5.6 billion in revenue. Their profit percentage was closer to 18percent, about double what exxon made. So why do people only complain about the oil company profits? If you had a choice to spend about about 4 billion and make 1 billion dollars profit or spend about 100 billion and make 10 billion profit which would you choose?

As far as the top executives making tons of cash. It doesn't really bother me that much. I mean if you want the highly skilled people you have to pay for them. If you want whoever jackass you can get try cutting their salaries.

the problem is HOW they are making this profit ... it's through record high oil prices ... why are oil prices at a record high? ... cuz of instability throughout the world ... why is there instability? ... cuz america has gone to war in that region and are threatening another country ... why are they going to war in the middle east? ... so that they can destabilize the region? ... why do they want to do that? ... so, that companies like exxon can make record profits ...

slightofjeff

woo hoo! My Exxon stock is going to go through the roof. Suck on that! The haves be having more.