HOUSTON (AP) — Exxon Mobil reported second-quarter earnings of $11.68 billion Thursday, the biggest quarterly profit ever by any U.S. corporation, but the results fell well short of Wall Street expectations and shares fell in premarket trading.
The world’s largest publicly traded oil company said net income for the April-June period came to $2.22 a share, up from $10.26 billion, or $1.83 a share, a year ago.
Revenue rose 40 percent to $138.1 billion from $98.4 billion in the year-earlier quarter.
Excluding an after-tax charge of $290 million related to an Exxon Valdez court settlement, earnings amounted to $11.97 billion, or $2.27 per share.
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ExxonMobil Breaks Profit Record
DETROIT (AP) - General Motors Corp. said Friday its losses widened to $15.5 billion in the second quarter as North American sales plummeted and the company faced expenses due to labor unrest and its massive restructuring plan.
The loss of $27.33 per share is the third-worst quarterly loss in the automaker’s history. In the same period a year earlier, GM recorded a net profit of $891 million, or $1.56 per share.
Revenue for the April-June period was $38.2 billion, down $8.5 billion from a year earlier.
The company said its loss included $9.1 billion in one-time charges, including $3.3 billion for the buyouts of 19,000 U.S. hourly workers, most of whom left at the end of June, as well as $2.8 billion in liabilities related to Delphi Corp. (DPHIQ), its former parts division.
Full Story Here:
GM posts $15.5 billion 2nd-quarter loss
Maybe some of you financial *whiz kids* can explain the difference between profit, loss, margin, gross and net earnings and all that to your own satisfaction. I can’t, and won’t even attempt to any more.
But imagine this, how well would things be going if Bush had been a supporter of GM and as involved there as he is with the big oil companies?
I can’t even begin to try and understand the numbers. It’s Greek to me.
Goal: Better understand the economics around me.
Tishs last blog post..A Bit Too Soon, Maybe?
Its actually pretty simple. The higher the prices go at the pump (or by the barrell for crude), the wider their margins (revenues minus cost) get. The cost of getting the oil out of the ground, once the well is drilled, remains constant (the cost of drilling the well, as well as the losses coming from dry holes, is part of their costs). As long as demand remains static, they continue to make loads of moolah (especially after their fixed costs are paid back)! If demand falls, they make less. As the price of crude falls (as in, the supply rises but demand remains static), their margin is less, even though they make money hand over fist.
So now question why they don’t drill the billions of barrells of crude supposedly under the North Dakota shale. Well they are. And as long as the price of crude stays high, their higher costs of retrieval are covered (all of this horizontal drilling costs more than drilling stright down).
The fact is, and I admit to hearing this on the rad-io yesterday. The billions in profits being taken by the Big Oil companies are being used to re-purchase their stock shares (the fewer shares outstanding, the more the outstanding shares are worth), instead of investing in new drilling/retrieval technologies.
Hope what I just wrote was OK.
Thanks StormWarning!
Fred have you ever watched “Black Gold” on on Tru TV? Really great show. I actually grew up in Midland, Texas where some of the footage is shot. My friends call me a geek for watching it but whatever. My family used to clean up this big oil business office building in downtown Midland, Dawson Geophysical Co.
My parents own their own janitorial business. I’ve seriously been working since I was 12 years old. I earned my keep. LOL.
“Black Gold” is about drilling and the roughnecks that risk their lives. I knew that oilmen in Midland were rich, I just didn’t know HOW rich until I started watching. It is a reality show but it’s good.
Tish’s last blog post..Hold The Heck On…I Wear Crocs
Tish, I have watched it, I was raised in the oil field, my Dad owned his own service company…
My 1st job as a teen was working on the floor of a rig like that…
I quickly decided that I needed to go into another field, and did…
I was raised in west Texas, south Louisiana and Oklahoma during the oil booms of the late 50′s and all thru the 60′s…
Storm, of course it was…
We won’t have to worry about oil company profits if BO is elected. Heard on the news today he wants to give every family in America $1,000 by taking the profits of the oil companies.
Let’s see, no matter what you think about oil company profits… The government forcibly taking money from one entity who they feel has too much and redistributing it evenly among those who did not earn it… Sounds like Communism/Marxism to me………
I’m in thanks.
Fred, I’m not even sure that I got it right (or only partially right). If I knew “so” much, I have sold all of my stocks on March 1, 2000 and not lost as much as I did 3 weeks later. But in trying to remember my Economics and Finance “stuff,” that’s what I could come up with.
Think about this: If GM and ExxonMobil swapped out debt for profit, tit for tat, would you call that a *break even*??
Reading into the subjec ta little…a company repurchases stock, it is using its cash (in this case, profits) to reduce the number of shares outstanding. By doing this, there are fewer shares in the float, and therefore, earning per share go up. Common stock is, I believe, actually carried by accountants as a liability (then again, it is imperative to understand that I almost failed accounting in college and grad school). I believe that on a balance sheet, it is a wash.