By Christian Moess Laursen


Shell launched a $3.5 billion share buyback program after third-quarter earnings rose on higher refining margins, oil prices and sales, but slightly missed market expectations.

The London-based company on Thursday reported adjusted earnings of $6.22 billion for the quarter, up from $5.07 billion in the preceding quarter, but slightly missing market expectations of $6.25 billion provided by Vara Research.

Last year, Shell posted third-quarter adjusted earnings--a metric that strips out certain commodity-price adjustments and one-time charges--of $9.45 billion as it benefited from exceptionally strong natural gas and fuel demand.

The company said the quarter's trading gains were driven by higher refining margins, realized oil prices, liquefied natural gas trading and higher upstream production, which all offset lower integrated gas volumes.

Total oil and gas production decreased by 9%, mainly due to more planned maintenance at the Prelude platform offshore Australia, at its Trinidad and Tobago operations, and production-sharing contract effects in the Pearl GTL plant in Qatar.

The oil-and-gas major launched a $3.5 billion share buyback to complete by the time its fourth-quarter results are released, following buybacks of $3 billion during the third quarter. Shell had guided for a buyback program of at least $2.5 billion.

In addition, Shell declared a stable dividend per share payout of 33.10 cents.

Overall, Shell's third-quarter profit on a current cost of supplies basis--a figure similar to the net income that U.S. oil companies report--was $6.15 billion, up from $3.49 billion in the second quarter.

Cash flow from operations--a measure of the cash a company generates from normal business operations--was $12.33 billion, exceeding market forecasts of $11.07 billion, based on the Vara Research-provided consensus.


Write to Christian Moess Laursen at christian.moess@wsj.com


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

11-02-23 0359ET