About Those Gas Prices…
BP profit jumps to 4.4 bln dlrs in third quarter
British oil giant BP said that net profit rose to 4.41 billion dollars (3.69 billion euros) during the third quarter, as record energy prices offset production damage caused by the recent US hurricanes.GOP to target Big Oil profitsThird quarter net profit, excluding gains from the value of its inventories, increased by 16 percent when compared with the 3.79 billion dollars BP earned during the third quarter of 2004.
House Republicans, worried about political fallout from the high-profit figures that oil companies are expected to release later this week, will demand that companies pour those profits into refining more oil for the U.S. market in order to lower prices.But what about the concept that the higher profits are FROM those higher prices? Especially when considering that analysts expect the major corporations to show a nearly 50 percent increase in profits from the same period in 2004 (same article). I seriously doubt that gas consumption leapt 50% or even 16% to account for these increased profits. Mayhaps these price increases weren’t all “necessary”.
2:30pm UPDATE: ConocoPhillips profit beats forecasts
ConocoPhillips, the No. 3 U.S. oil company, on Wednesday reported quarterly profit surged 89 percent, surpassing Wall Street forecasts, driven by record oil prices and sharply higher refining margins.…
Profit at its refining and marketing operations rose to $1.39 billion from $708 million a year earlier, but were hit by outages at three Gulf Coast refineries.
