The State Of The Industry: Q3, 2019

Lower crude prices across the board across July-August saw financial performance from oil supermajors fall in response. This was despite a temporary spike in prices from an attack on the world’s largest crude processing plant in Saudi Arabia; initially fearing the worst, the recovery in Saudi production capacity was largely re-instated within 2-3 weeks, returning oil prices to a downward trend. Worries about the overall health of the world economy is depressing demand for oil, with particular worrying economic data from India and China.

The decline were across the board, with ExxonMobil taking the biggest hit. Quarterly profits were down by almost 50%. Despite oil and oil-equivalent production rising by 3% (driven by shale liquids production in the Permian), the fall was largely due to lower crude prices. It was actually anticipated, and results actually topped analyst expectations. ExxonMobil has stated that it is making ‘excellent progress’ on its long-term growth strategy, citing potential production coming from its blockbuster discoveries in Guyana. ExxonMobil’s results were also clouded by its current trial in New York, over misleading investors over its financial reporting.

BP and Chevron also reported large drops in their quarterly results. BP’s net profit fell 39.7% - beating expectations on lower upstream earnings and weaker oil prices. BP’s CEO Bob Dudley will be stepping down from his role as CEO, completing a tenure that has seen him rebuild the company in the aftermath of the Deep Horizon disaster back to regular profitability. Chevron mirrored the decline with net profits falling by 36%, again within expectations.

The champion among the supermajors was, once again, Shell. Quarterly profits were down by 15%, with Shell citing prices and lower chemicals margins. Upstream profits were down 51.9% y-o-y, but Shell’s broader focus on downstream and natural gas over the past few years has paid off, with the downstream and integrated gas units reporting adjusted income that were 7.1% and 16.7% higher than Q318. Buoyed by this, Shell announced that it was launching the next tranche of its share buyback programme, repurchasing US$2.75 billion worth of shares up to January 2020 as part of its major, 3-ear US$25 billion buyback programme.

Total also performed relatively well. That doesn’t mean it was immune from the overall market trends, it was shielded by the start-up of the Culzean gas field in the UK North Sea bolstering its bottom line. Output contribution from Culzean, which started up in June, helped overall production rise to 3 mmboe/d. Better performance is expected in Q419, as the startup of Equinor’s massive Johan Sverdrup field, in which Total owns a 8.44% stake which should allow y-o-y production growth to reach 9%, up from the current 8%.

This does reflect the general pull back from offshore among the supermajors, as the focus has defaulted to onshore opportunities of shale. In that sense, they are a victim of their own success, surging US shale production has blunted the ability of the OPEC+ club to keep prices in the higher US$60-70/b range, burdening their bottom line. The two best performers – Shell and Total – stand out as being the two with the strongest downstream and, in particular, natural gas businesses: a diversification that spreads the risk. And with prices in no position to climb back it, it is this distinction that will continue to colour performance among the world’s largest oil companies.

Supermajor Financials Q3 2019:

• ExxonMobil – Revenue (US$65 billion, down 15.1% y-o-y), Net profit (US$3.17 billion, down 49.1% y-o-y)
• Shell - Revenue (US$89.5 billion, down 11.9% y-o-y), Net profit (US$4.7 billion, down 15% y-o-y)
• Chevron – Revenue (US$36.1 billion, down 17.8% y-o-y), Net profit (US$2.58 billion, down 36% y-o-y)
• BP - Revenue (US$69.3 billion, down 14.2% y-o-y), Net profit (US$2.3 billion, down 40% y-o-y)
• Total - Revenue (US$48.5 billion, down 11% y-o-y), Net profit (US$2.8 billion, down 29% y-o-y)

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