据今日油价2月2日报道，英国石油公司(BP Plc)提供的数据表明，大型石油公司几乎还没有开始愈合去年历史性暴跌带来的创伤。
在大宗商品价格走强的推动下，西方世界最大的能源生产商本应迎来第四季度财报季，但英国石油业绩下滑和雪佛龙公司意外亏损显示出新冠肺炎疫情带来的持久影响。利润低于预期主要是由于燃料销售和炼油利润的疲软。
英国石油勉强维持了一笔微薄的利润，但这只是疫情爆发前基本水平的一小部分。尽管公司大幅削减了股息和资本支出，但现金流未能覆盖这两项支出，这让人们对该公司维持投资者回报的能力产生了更大的怀疑，该公司股票下跌了4%。
雷德伯恩分析师斯图尔特 乔伊纳（stuartjoyner）表示：“2020年造成了一个极具挑战的结尾。营运现金流仍然非常疲弱，未达到预期。我们可能会看到净债务在第一季度恶化，这将降低股东分配改善的预期。”
英国石油第四季度经调整后的净利润为1.15亿美元，低于上年同期的25.7亿美元，仅较前三个月略有改善。该公司的净利润没有达到分析师平均预期的4.4亿美元。
不包括墨西哥湾漏油事件支付的营运现金流(对投资者而言，这是决定股息支付和资本支出可持续性的关键数据)要弱得多。从第三季度的54亿美元降至24亿美元。英国石油首席执行官伯纳德 鲁尼表示:“很明显，在艰难的2020年结束之际，公司全年业绩受到了新冠肺炎疫情的沉重打击。”
尽管多数石油公司因原油价格走强而上涨，但在伦敦时间上午9点42分，英国石油股价下跌4%，至256.4便士。
由于疫苗的推出以及经济复苏的前景提振了原油价格和炼油利润率，投资者原本预计，这惨淡的2020年将以更加积极的状态结束。一些乐观情绪已经被市场消化——英国石油及其同行的股价自2020年第三季度末以来出现了两位数百分比的涨幅。
然而，炼油业务拖累了该公司的业绩。英国石油表示，疫情导致的交易量减少“严重”影响了该业务，利润率持续受到压力。早前曾在疫情爆发时期有大作为的营销和交易部门，在第四季度几乎没有提供什么帮助，天然气行业的表现尤其疲弱。
鲁尼表示:“美国的天气比我们想象的要暖和，而亚洲的天气比我们想象的要冷，这造成了一些艰难的贸易环境，2021年的开局不容乐观。”
截至2020年底，英国石油净负债较上一季度减少14亿美元，至390亿美元。尽管如此，该公司表示，预计2021年上半年净负债还将增加，原因是与员工遣散费、墨西哥湾石油泄漏年度赔偿金以及与Equinor ASA的海上风电合资企业完工有关款项的存在。该公司净负债与权益之比为31%。
英国石油公司首席财务官默里·奥金克洛斯在一份声明中表示：“BP仍有望在2021年第四季度至2022年第一季度之间解决350亿美元的净债务目标。这将触发股票回购，但前提是要保持强劲的投资级信用评级。”
埃克森美孚将于美国纽约时间上午7点30分公布第四季度收益。
王佳晶 摘译自 今日油价
原文如下：
BP’s Weak Quarter Shows Big Oil Has Barely Begun Covid Recovery
BP Plc offered more evidence that Big Oil has barely begun to heal the wounds from last year’s historic slump.
The Western world’s largest energy producers were supposed to be sailing into the fourth-quarter earnings season with a tailwind from stronger commodity prices, but BP’s miss and Chevron Corp.’s surprise loss show the enduring impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. Earnings fell short of expectations mainly due to weak fuel sales and refining margins.
BP eked out a modest profit, but it was just a fraction of typical pre-pandemic levels. Cash flow, which failed to cover dividends and capital expenditure despite deep cuts to both, raised more fundamental questions about the company’s ability to sustain investor returns. Shares fell 4%.
“This was a challenging end to 2020,” said Stuart Joyner, an analyst at Redburn. “Operating cash flow remains very weak and missed expectations. We will likely see net debt worsen in the first quarter, which will temper expectations of better shareholder distributions.”
BP’s fourth-quarter adjusted net income was $115 million, down from $2.57 billion a year earlier and only a slight improvement from the preceding three months. The company fell short of the average analyst estimate of $440 million.
Operating cash flow excluding Gulf of Mexico spill payments, a key figure for investors as it determines the sustainability of dividend payments and capital expenditure, was much weaker. It fell to $2.4 billion in the period, down from $5.4 billion in the third quarter.
“Tough quarter, clearly, at the end of a really tough year,” BP Chief Executive Officer Bernard Looney said in a Bloomberg TV interview on Tuesday. “The full-year results were hit hard by Covid.”
BP shares fell 4% to 256.4 pence at 9:42 a.m. in London, even as most oil companies rallied with stronger crude prices.
With crude prices and refining margins buoyed by the roll-out of Covid-19 vaccines and the prospect of an economic rebound, investors had been expecting a grim year to end on a more positive note. Some optimism had already been priced in, with shares of BP and its peers posting double-digit percentage gains since the end of the third quarter of 2020.
Yet refining weighed down the company’s performance. BP said the business was affected “significantly” by lower volumes as a result of the pandemic, with continuing pressure on margins.
Marketing and trading, which came to BP’s rescue earlier in the pandemic, offered little assistance in the fourth quarter, with a particularly weak performance on natural gas.
“Weather was warmer in the United States than we thought and colder in Asia than we thought, and that made for some difficult trading conditions,” Looney said. Trading is off to a “very good” start this year, he said.
Net debt was down $1.4 billion from the preceding quarter to $39 billion at year-end. Still, BP said it expects the figure to increase in the first half of 2021, driven by payments related to employee severance, the annual Gulf of Mexico oil spill compensation, and the completion of the offshore wind joint venture with Equinor ASA. The ratio of net debt to equity was 31%.
BP remains on track to meet its net-debt target of $35 billion between the fourth quarter of 2021 and first quarter of 2022, “which will trigger the start of share buybacks, subject to maintaining a strong investment grade credit rating,” Chief Financial Officer Murray Auchincloss said in a statement.
Exxon Mobil Corp. will publish its fourth-quarter earnings at 7:30 a.m. New York time.
