Oil company Exxon today reported a 56 per cent rise in quarterly profit on soaring oil and gas prices.
Net income in the third quarter for the world's largest publicly traded oil company jumped to $5.68 billion, or 88 cents a share, compared with $3.65 billion, or 55 cents a share, in the year earlier period.
Excluding a $550 million charge related to a legal action, the company reported record earnings of $6.23 billion, or 96 cents a share. Wall Street expected 87 cents a share.
Revenues jumped to $76.38 billion in the quarter from $59.84 billion a year earlier.
Earnings from upstream operations shot up to $3.93 billion, reflecting record crude oil and natural gas prices in the quarter.
Earnings at its downstream operations rose to $1.40 billion as improved refining conditions outweighed the pinch from continued weakness in marketing margins.
Oil prices, which have been on an upward march this year, have touched record levels in recent months due to fears of supply disruption in regions such as Nigeria and Russia as well as strong demand from growing economies like China and India.
Oil and gas production in the quarter rose to 3.91 million barrels of oil equivalent a day from 3.87 million barrels in the year-earlier quarter.