[R]2:00PM New York – Exxon Mobil earnings in the fourth quarter rose 14% on 18% rise in sales. Chevron reported 9% rise in net income in 2007.[/R]

Exxon Mobil reported fourth quarter net income rise of 14% to $11.66 billion from a year ago and earnings per share increased to $2.13 per share or 21% from $1.76 per share a year ago. For the year earnings increased 3% to $40.6 billion and earnings per share rose 10% to $7.28. Approximately 81% of Exxon earnings are generated from international operations.

Revenues in the quarter rose 18% to $116 billion from $90 billion a year ago and for the year jumped 7.2% to $404.55 billion in 2007 from a year ago.

Liquids production of 2,517 kbd (thousands of barrels per day) was 161 kbd lower. Excluding the Venezuela expropriation, divestments, OPEC quota effects and price and spend impacts on volumes, liquids production was down 3%. Mature field decline and PSC net interest reductions were partly offset by increased production from projects in Russia and West Africa.

Global oil and natural production declined 1.3% in 2007 and would have increased 1% if it had owned the expropriated assets in Venezuela and 100,000 barrels of oil lost in sharing oil with foreign government on the account of rising oil prices.

The world’s largest oil company by revenue and market capitalization reported largest quarterly and annual profit in the U.S. history from recurring business. AT&T and Ford have reported higher profits according to Howard Silverblatt, a senior index analyst at Standard & Poor’s quoted in the Wall Street Journal.

The Marimba North project, located more than 90 miles off the coast of Angola in approximately 3,900 feet of water, started production ahead of schedule and within budget, according to the earnings release. The project is the first tie-back development to the Kizomba A infrastructure, and is designed to develop 80 million barrels of oil (gross) and is expected to have peak production capacity of about 40,000 barrels of oil per day (gross).


Chevron reported fourth quarter earnings of $4.9 billion or $2.32 per share compared to $3.8 billion or $1.74 per share. For the full year net income rose 9% to $18.70 billion or $8.77 per share compared to $17.1 billion or $7.80 per share.

“Fourth quarter earnings for our upstream business benefited from a significant increase in the price of crude oil,” said Chairman and CEO Dave O’Reilly. “However, downstream profits were off sharply because of planned and unplanned refinery downtime in the United States, as well as the impact of higher crude-oil costs that were not fully recovered in the sales price of refined products.

“Our results overall capped a successful year for our company,” O’Reilly added. “We achieved record earnings in 2007 and invested a record $20 billion in our excellent queue of capital and exploratory projects. Our financial strength also enabled us to increase the common stock dividend payment for the 20th consecutive year and buy back $7 billion of our common shares.”

Chevron agreed with its unnamed partners to build liquefied natural gas plant with a maximum capacity of one billion cubic feet per day and 5.2 million metric tons of LNG and related products a year.

Chevron commissioned new facilities associated with a $1.5 billion upgrade of the 50 percent-owned GS Caltex Yeosu Refinery, enabling the refinery to process heavier and higher-sulfur crude oils and increase the production of gasoline, diesel and other light products.

Worldwide oil-equivalent production was 2.61 million barrels per day in the fourth quarter 2007, down 42,000 barrels per day from the corresponding 2006 period. Approximately 25,000 barrels per day of the decline was associated with the impact of higher prices on cost-recovery and variable-royalty volumes.