Gas Prices

[frisco]

Hey - Is anyone else as psyched as I am to see gas prices going up by a dime every day for the past week?!?

This is awesome!!!!

 

[Disney Doll]

Of course they are going up. Summer is coming, the oil companies know that there will be more people driving...vacation, picking up kids from college etc. so of course the prices go up.

This happens every year.

 

[frisco]

Of course they are going up. Summer is coming, the oil companies know that there will be more people driving...vacation, picking up kids from college etc. so of course the prices go up.

This happens every year.

I don't recall them ever going up by a dime, literally every day. Even when they got over $4 per gallon, it was a progressing situation. A dime a day seems like an awful lot more than usual for the summer.

 

[swald91]

Yeah, I agree-they are going too quickly for Memorial Day approaching. Maybe once this weekend is gone, the prices will start to go in the other direction?????

 

[nd5056]

I don't recall them ever going up by a dime, literally every day. Even when they got over $4 per gallon, it was a progressing situation. A dime a day seems like an awful lot more than usual for the summer.

I bet you don't recall headlines like this as well, no?

Exxon profit falls on economy, lower prices

The oil company says net income fell 58% in the first-quarter as demand for energy slumped.

By Ben Rooney, CNNMoney.com staff writer
Last Updated: April 30, 2009: 12:17 PM ET

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Exxon Mobil reported a big drop in first-quarter earnings and revenue Thursday due to lower commodity prices and the weak global economy.

The Irving, Texas-based company said it earned $4.5 billion in the first quarter, down 58% from $10.89 billion a year earlier. On a per-share basis, Exxon said it earned 92 cents, off 54% from $2.03 in the first quarter of 2008.

Analysts were expecting earnings of 95 cents per share, according to Thomson Reuters.

Exxon, along with most other energy companies, has seen its profit decline with the price of oil, which has tumbled nearly $100 a barrel from last summer's all-time high.

Revenue in the quarter plunged 45% to $64 billion as the weak global economy undercut demand for energy. But sales were higher than the $54 billion that analysts had forecast.

Even as oil prices decline, Exxon said spending on exploration projects rose 5% to $5.8 billion in the quarter.

Looking ahead, the company said it expects to spend $29 billion on capital expenditures this year.

"We are committed to investing in our world-class inventory of projects to develop new energy supplies which are vital to economic growth," Exxon said in a statement.

Oil and gas production in the quarter rose slightly to 4.2 million barrels per day. Excluding certain entitlements, the effects of OPEC quotas and divestments, Exxon said production was up 2%, Exxon said.

In a conference call with analysts, Exxon reaffirmed its expectation to produce about 4 million barrels per day for all of 2009.

"In spite of the dramatic changes to the global economic environment, Exxon Mobil is maintaining its long-term focus and disciplined approach to capital investment," the company said.

Exxon returned a total of $9 billion to shareholders through dividends and share purchases. In the second quarter, the company expects to spend about $5 billion on share repurchases.

"They still have huge amount of cash on their balance sheet," Gheit said. "They can do whatever they want, and they are using their cash to buy back stock and increase dividends."

Exxon (XOM, Fortune 500) shares were down about 3% to $66.61 in Thursday trading. To top of page
First Published: April 30, 2009: 8:16 AM ET



Find this article at:
http://money.cnn.com/2009/04/30/news/companies/Exxon_earns/index.htm

 

[TangaroaTiki]

Yeah, they inch it up little by little thinking maybe us dummies won't notice

 

[frisco]

Oil companies profits "dipping" is almost an oxy-moron. Their profits are so outrageously high to begin with, it would take a disastorous dip for them to be hurting the way most companies are.

 

[Cool-Beans]

DH is gambling on oil. I don't much understand it all - ETFs and calls and executions and all - but I do know that so far, we're making $250/month after fees on the oil, which helps pay for the gas. Between that and the free grocery store gas, we don't have to pay for gas.

The way I understand it, we keep making money until someone blows up the refineries or whatever (which he's sure will happen) and then we'll stop making money, but won't lose any.

He said the prices can go up and it makes no difference, so I guess they can go up.

 

[cteddiesgirl]

I don't recall them ever going up by a dime, literally every day. Even when they got over $4 per gallon, it was a progressing situation. A dime a day seems like an awful lot more than usual for the summer.

A dime? That's it? Try 23 cents. Yep. The other day it went up 23 cents around here. it did the same a couple weeks ago too. Then again, I live in Indy. The month of May always has higher gas prices due to people coming in for the race.
This doesn't include the inching up almost every day either.

 

[daughtersrus]

Yep! We have the highest gas prices in the entire country here in the Chicago area.

We're required to switch to summer blend here as well and that has added to the costs. Although $2.55 is more than I want to pay, it still beat the prices that we had a year ago.

We'll still be heading to the lake this weekend. Gas prices there are a little less and it's regular gas so we'll get better gas mileage on the way home and until that tank runs out.

 

[endy]

Two weeks ago it went up .10/litre here in Alberta. It also went up 3 or 4 cents/litre last week, always goes up just before a long weekend.
That would be close to .38/gallon.

Hope it stays under $3/gallon for summer.

 

[Kathi OD]

Ours went up 7 cents in 2 hours on Saturday, and then 2 more cents on Sunday. The prices are going up because inventories are down. The oil companies just aren't producing as much gasoline so that they can keep the prices inflated now. When demand increases, they'll send prices higher claiming those supplies are so low.

 

[Darsa]

Yeah, we had made plans to head up to the state park 2 hours north of us, but we got so excited about the gas prices that we decided to change that and go to the lake 1/2 hour away.

Sigh.

 

[tink_n_pooh]

Oil companies profits "dipping" is almost an oxy-moron. Their profits are so outrageously high to begin with, it would take a disastorous dip for them to be hurting the way most companies are.

Thats what I was thinking

 

[Tinker'n'Fun]

Come on over to WNY. Our prices are through the roof compared to many other cities. No one knows why but we are climbing, up, up, and away!!

 

[John VN]

Yeah, I agree-they are going too quickly for Memorial Day approaching. Maybe once this weekend is gone, the prices will start to go in the other direction?????

VERY UNLIKELY!!!

The price we pay at the pump has a direct correlation with the NYMEX pricing of RBOB. The price today for RBOB is hovering around $1.80 for June which means that in a couple to three weeks we could see an additional 20 to 30 cents per gallon price increase. Maybe even more.

http://www.wtrg.com/daily/rbobgasolineprice.html

NOTE: The $1.7581 per gallon price at closing yesterday with an additional $.70 to $.80 added on for costs and profits will be seen in June pump prices. RBOB prices for todays gas was in the $1.50 range back in April.

 

[tazdev3225]

We had an explosion at the Sunoco refinery sunday night. It didn't involve the oil for gas but they are already saying that the price of gas will be rising a lot because they will be in short supply now. Any excuse to gouge the consumer.

 

[Golf4food]

We had an explosion at the Sunoco refinery sunday night. It didn't involve the oil for gas but they are already saying that the price of gas will be rising a lot because they will be in short supply now. Any excuse to gouge the consumer.

In spite of the fact that there was already a surplus that was being reported just days prior...

Idiots. Just what the economy needs is higher gas prices. They think people aren't shopping or going on vacation now? Go ahead and raise the gas prices back up and see how much more people buy... yeah, that's the ticket... morons.

 

[brerrabbit]

I have said it before but people just like to scream about oil company profits instead of understanding many things about why gas prices do what they do. A lot of the run up at this time of the year is directly related to government mandated requirements for fuel blends during the summer season. During the summer refiners are obligated and consumers are forced to buy lower RVP blends of gas. In certain areas like Kansas City the requirement is for 7.0 RVP which cost .11 a gallon more for regular and .16 a gallon more for premium. Currently refiners are forced to make over 60 different blends of gas based on where their product will wind up being sold. This hurts prices because gasoline cannot necessarily be moved around freely. Neighboring states don't burn the same gas so if one is long gas and one is short they cannot just ship it across the border. Also consider this many of the refinery owners in the US are not 'Big Oil" companies and several are teetering on the brink of bankruptcy while others have already declared it. Check out Tesoro who is hurting pretty bad right now, or Big West Flying J that declared in December.

Refiners live on the crack spred, which is the difference between the price of a barrel of oil and the price they can sell a barrel of refined product for and those have not been very good for a while. Also due to demand refinery utilization has been running at below 80% because they have not needed to run any more than that. Several years ago that number was more like 95% +.

 

[manning]

Looks like the speculators are at it again!!