Exxon Mobil swings to loss as revenue falls nearly 30%, but results beat Wall Street views

Shares of Exxon Mobil Corp. inched 0.1% lower in premarket trading Friday, after the oil giant swung to a loss and revenue fell nearly 30%, as the COVID-19 pandemic took a bite, but the results beat Wall Street expectations. The company reported a net loss of $680 million, or 15 cents a share, after net income of $3.17 billion, or 75 cents a share, in the year-ago period. Excluding non-recurring items, the adjusted per-share loss was 18 cents, narrower than the FactSet loss consensus of 26 cents. Revenue dropped 29.0% to $46.20 billion, but was above the FactSet consensus of $45.37 billion. For the upstream business, realizations for crude oil "improved significantly" from the second quarter, as market prices increased. "Improved market conditions enabled full recovery of production impacted by economic curtailments," the company stated. "Government mandated curtailments negatively impacted third quarter results and are anticipated to continue in the fourth quarter." For downstream, higher product sales due to increased demand and higher marketing margins offset lower fuels margins driven by market oversupply. The stock has tumbled 52.8% year to date through Thursday, while the SPDR Energy Select Sector ETF has lost 52.4% and the S&P 500 has gained 2.5%.

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