Oil and gas companies Shell and TotalEnergies have again made huge profits during the gas crisis. For example, the British Shell managed to make a profit of 6.7 billion dollars in the last quarter. The French TotalEnergies came up with a doubling of the profit to almost ten billion dollars.
For both companies, these are significant leaps forward compared to 2021. For Shell, the profit is somewhat lower compared to a quarter earlier, when a gigantic profit of 18 billion dollars was recorded. Despite this, higher energy prices are still being taken advantage of, partly thanks to government interventions that, for example, reduce fuel prices in order to keep demand high.
For Shell, profits are good, as it plans to buy in more new shares. More than four billion dollars are spent on this, in order to reward shareholders. In addition, the company also wants to increase the dividend for shareholders. There is a lot of dissatisfaction about the high profits in the UK. Therefore, the government has also introduced a so-called’ windfall tax’, with which usury profits must be skimmed.
With the extra money, the UK wants to support households during the energy crisis. The problem, however, is that Shell has not yet had to spend a penny on the new tax measure last quarter. The reason lies in the’ substantial investments ‘that the company has made for energy production in the North Sea, so that no’ lucky tax ‘ has to be paid. Shell does not expect to lose any money on this new tax in the current quarter either.
For TotalEnergies, the huge profit is also good. Because the profit has doubled compared to the quarter last year, it can reward shareholders even more. The French company already announced that shareholders will receive a dividend of 1 euro per share, in December
The entire energy sector is currently benefiting from the extremely high prices, as a result of which record profits are being made. A report by the International Energy Agency shows that the profits of all energy-producing companies amount to more than 2 trillion euros..
