US oil major Chevron has warned it expects fourth-quarter profits to be lower than anticipated after seeing production drops during the last three months.
The North Sea operator said production had been impacted by planned downtime across the Gulf of Mexico, along with maintenance work in Australia and at the company’s liquefied natural gas plant in Angola. In a market update yesterday, the world’s second-largest energy company by market value said profits for the fourth quarter 2013 were expected to be “comparable” with its third quarter.
Chevron’s net income reached £3billion in the third quarter, which represented a drop on the £4.4billion profits in the same quarter last year.
Last month the firm said it would cut back on the amount it spends on exploration this year – down £1.2billion to £24.4billion as costs of its giant liquefied natural gas (LNG) project in Australia soar.
The American oil major announced delays to its £6billion plans for the Rosebank Field – which would have created 300 jobs in Aberdeen alone.
Chevron said it was continuing to work with partners OMV and Dong on the project, but that the current economics of Rosebank posed problems.
Chevron chief executive John Watson said 2013 was a “peak year” for investment for the firm.
The company, which will publish its full results on January 31, follows rival ConocoPhillips in reporting a downturn in production over the last quarter.
Refinery volumes were up in the US after the completion of planned maintenance activity at the El Segundo refinery in California during the third quarter, but international refinery levels were down slightly.
In 2013, Chevron’s net US production was 441,000 barrels of oil per day, compared with 462,000 during the same period in 2012, while international production was 1.28million barrels per day, down from the 1.33million the previous year.