By Ron Bousso and Shadia Nasralla
LONDON (Reuters) – BP on Tuesday reported a third-quarter profit of $8.15 billion, easily beating expectations, boosted by strong natural gas trading, and announced another $2.5 billion in share repurchases.
BP is the last top Western energy giant to report quarterly results after rivals including Shell, Exxon Mobil and TotalEnergiesPA> last week reported another round of bumper profits that revived calls from politicians to hit the sector with new windfall taxes to help governments with soaring energy bills.
U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday called on major oil companies who are bringing in big profits to stop “war profiteering”, threatening to hit them with higher taxes if they don’t increase production.
BP, which increased its dividend by 10% in the quarter, will buy back $2.5 billion of shares after repurchasing $7.6 billion so far this year. BP has committed to using 60% of its excess cashflow for shareholder returns.
BP’s third-quarter underlying replacement cost profit of $8.15 billion, the company’s definition of net income, compared with forecasts of a $6 billion loss in a company-provided survey of analysts.
The result was helped by “an exceptional gas marketing and trading result” as well as higher gas prices, offsetting weaker refining margins and “average” oil trading.
BP made a profit of $3.3 billion a year earlier and a 14-year high profit of $8.45 billion in the second quarter of 2022.
(Reporting by Ron Bousso and Shadia Nasralla; editing by Kirsten Donovan and Jason Neely)
