Texas-Based Exxon Mobil Loses US$1 billion due to COVID-19

TEXAS – Two American oil giants lost more than US$9 billion in the second quarter as the coronavirus pandemic kept households on lockdown, cutting a gaping hole into a once-thriving business as the need for oil diminished.

Irving-based Exxon Mobil Corp. lost US$1.1 billion in the second quarter, and the oil producer brought in US$32.6 billion in revenue, less than half of what it brought in at the same time last year. Chevron Corp. lost US$8.27 billion during the quarter, a sharp contrast to the US$4.3 billion it earned a year ago.

The quarter was one of the worst on record for the oil industry. The price of a barrel of benchmark U.S. crude fell below $0 in April, a stunning downfall that had not before been seen in the industry. Producers had been pumping far more oil than the world was using as global travel all but shut down, and storage tanks were filling up. Petroleum consumption fell to a more than 30-year low in April, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Oil prices have recovered somewhat since, but have been stuck at around US$40 a barrel for weeks, fetching 30% less than a barrel did a year ago and well below what most producers need to make ends meet.

“As a result, the U.S. oil industry lost more than 100,000 jobs since February, with 45,000 of those jobs shed by upstream oil and gas companies in Texas alone,” according to Rystad Energy, a consulting firm.

Source: DFW