Shell makes record quarterly profits of nearly $10bn
Royal Dutch Shell made record first-quarter profits of more than $9.6bn (£7.6bn) in the first three months of this year, even as oil and gas prices tumbled from last year’s highs.
The better-than-expected adjusted earnings topped its previous first-quarter profit record set last year at $9.1bn for the same period, and were well above the $7.96bn predicted by industry analysts.
Europe’s biggest oil and gas company will now offer shareholders $4bn in share buybacks over the next three months.
The Anglo-Dutch energy company said profits rose thanks to its trading teams which were able to mitigate against the falling market price for oil and gas.
Global oil prices averaged $81.7 a barrel in the first quarter of this year, according to Shell, down from $102.2 a barrel in the same period a year earlier, when Russia’s invasion of Ukraine ignited a surge in oil and gas markets.
Shell’s new chief executive, Wael Sawan, said the company had delivered “strong results and robust operational performance, against a backdrop of ongoing volatility”.
The company reported a record annual profit of $40bn for 2022 after posting better than expected profits in the final quarter of last year. The full-year profits were more than double what it reported in 2021 due to rocketing oil and gas market prices last year, leading to calls for a windfall tax on the earnings.
Tommy Vickerstaff, a campaigner at 350.org, which opposes new oil and gas projects, said governments should impose tougher taxes on oil companies’ “obscenely high” profits.
“The UK government has consistently failed to adequately tax these profits despite everyone’s bills going up and millions more people being pushed into fuel poverty,” said Vickerstaff.
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