XOM Exxon Mobil Corp

By Ezequiel Minaya 

Exxon Mobil Corp.'s profit in the second quarter nearly doubled as the oil giant continued to see its business rebound amid recovering commodity prices.

But shares in the company slipped 2% in premarket trading to $79.20 as the company missed Wall Street's expectations on earnings.

Oil prices have risen recently to two-month highs on building momentum from recent inventory declines. U.S. prices have settled above the $49 mark for the first time since May 30 and momentum-based traders appear poised to send prices back above $50 a barrel, brokers have said.

Exxon Mobil, the largest U.S. oil company, has joined its peers in cutting spending through a prolonged downturn that has seen crude prices fall from $114 a barrel to $27 a barrel and remain about $50 a barrel.

"These solid results across our businesses were driven by higher commodity prices and a continued focus on operations and business fundamentals," said Darren Woods, chairman and chief executive, in prepared remarks.

Mr. Woods took the helm recently from Rex Tillerson, who was tapped by President Donald Trump to serve as U.S. Secretary of State.

For the June quarter, Exxon reported its profit climbed to $3.35 billion, or 78 cents a share, from $1.70 billion, or 41 cents a share, a year earlier. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected earnings of 84 cents a share.

In the first quarter, the company posted profit of $4.01 billion, up from $1.81 billion a year earlier.

Revenue rose 9% to $62.88 billion, which came in about $1 billion ahead of estimates from analysts.

The exploration and production, or upstream, business swung to a $1.18 billion profit from a $294 million loss a year ago. In the U.S., the upstream division narrowed its loss to $183 million from $514 million the year before.

In the refining and marketing, or downstream, business, earnings were $1.39 billion, up $825 million from the year-earlier period, lifted by improved refinery volume and better margins.

Write to Ezequiel Minaya at ezequiel.minaya@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 28, 2017 09:19 ET (13:19 GMT)

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