British oil giant Shell on Thursday announced a sharp rise in first-quarter profit, closing the march of a season of flamboyant results for the giants of the sector, despite the decline in hydrocarbon prices.
Together, BP, Shell, ExxonMobil, Chevron and TotalEnergies posted more than 40 billion dollars (36 billion euros) in profits this quarter.
For Shell, the group’s net profit is up 22% year on year to $8.7 billion.
Its results benefited in particular from a drop in operating expenses and a better performance in chemicals. Its quarterly turnover stands at 89 billion dollars (+7%).
Shell’s first quarter results have a comparative advantage over the same period last year, at the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, when the energy giant spent a hefty $3.9 billion of dollars linked to its progressive withdrawal from Russia, although much less significant than that of its rival BP.
Shell’s chief executive, Wael Sawan, welcomed in a press release Thursday “solid” results and indicated that the group will start a share buyback program of 4 billion dollars for the next three months.
This announcement pushed the action which took 2% to 2373 pence on the London Stock Exchange around 8:30 GMT.
Michael Hewson, analyst at CMC Markets, notes that the stock has fallen since March on a “combination of concerns over a slowdown in global demand”, given the risks of recession and banking crisis which persist, “and because of a marked decline in oil and gas prices” over the past year.
Prices soared in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, pushing the sector’s results to record levels last year, before falling again, to the point that the cartel of producing countries OPEC + recently intervened by reducing its production to try to support them.
“Despite the pressures on crude prices, Shell is distributing vast amounts of cash” to its shareholders, “but this should undoubtedly revive calls for more contributions to the Treasury coffers”, judge Derren Nathan, analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown .
Especially since energy bills, which have been a major contributor to a cost of living crisis in the UK and elsewhere, have not come down.
“Obscene profits”
Pro-environment NGOs have planned to demonstrate in front of Shell’s headquarters, after disrupting the general meetings of BP or Barclays, a bank they accuse of over-financing the extraction of polluting hydrocarbons and contributing to global warming.
“The UK government should stop issuing new oil and gas licenses and force Shell and the rest of the industry to start using their obscene profits to repair the damage their fossil fuels are causing around the world,” he said. Greenpeace said in a statement.
BP however won the majority of votes at its general meeting on Thursday, despite a significant share of shareholders protesting against its decision to slow down its energy transition or against its compensation plan.
The British group announced in February, on the sidelines of record annual results, that it intended to boost its profits by 2030 by investing more both in renewable energies and in hydrocarbons, slowing down the pace of its energy transition.
TotalEnergies, which earned a 12% increase in profit in the first quarter to $5.6 billion, is in turn preparing for a heated climate debate with some of its shareholders at its AGM on May 26.
Across the Atlantic, ExxonMobil was particularly successful: its net profit more than doubled over one year to 11.4 billion dollars, a record for a first quarter.
Chevron’s net profit rose 5% to $6.6 billion.
The leaders of the big energy companies have also been controversial in recent months with their sharply increasing remuneration: in the midst of the economic crisis, that of the ex-Shell boss Ben van Beurden had climbed last year to 9.7 million pounds. , an increase of 53% over one year.