Archived article
Please note that tax, investment, pension and ISA rules can change and the information and any views contained in this article may now be inaccurate.
Royal Dutch Shell has reported that its second quarter results reflected lower prices for oil, LNG and gas as income attributable to shareholders was a loss of $18.1bn during the quarter.
The company said this included an impairment charge of $16.8bn post-tax or $22.3bn pre-tax, as a result of 'revised medium- and long-term price and refining margin outlook assumptions in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and macroeconomic conditions as well as energy market demand and supply fundamentals'.
Half year segment earnings were a loss of $6.1bn, which included a post-tax impairment charge of $8.2bn, mainly related to the Queensland Curtis LNG and Prelude floating LNG operations in Australia.
The company reported adjusted earnings of $0.6bn for the second quarter of 2020, reflecting lower realised prices for oil, LNG and gas, lower realised refining margins, oil products sales volumes and higher well write-offs, compared with the second quarter of 2019.
Royal Dutch Shell announced cash flow from operating activities for the second quarter was $2.6bn, which included negative working capital movements of $4bn.
Compared with the second quarter of 2019, total production decreased by 2%, which the company said was mainly due to more maintenance activities in Australia and lower demand.
In the first half of 2020, total production rose 5% compared with the same period in 2019, mainly due to less maintenance activities, new fields and field ramp-ups, as well as the transfer of the Rashpetco operations in Egypt from the upstream segment.
Cash flow from operating activities for the first half of 2020 was $6.6bn.
Chief executive Ben van Beurden said: 'Shell has delivered resilient cash flow in a remarkably challenging environment. We continue to focus on safe and reliable operations and our decisive cash preservation measures will underpin the strengthening of our balance sheet.' At 9:25am: (LON:RDSA) Royal Dutch Shell PLC share price was -4.9p at 1221.9p