Exxon, Shell Post Higher Earnings

Exxon Mobil Corp., the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, posted its biggest quarterly profit ever Thursday, and Royal Dutch/Shell Group saw its earnings rise 54%, thanks to higher prices for oil and natural gas.

Irving, Texas-based Exxon Mobil earned $5.79 billion, or 88 cents a share, in the April-June period, compared with $4.17 billion, or 62 cents, a year earlier. That matched the forecast of analysts surveyed by Thomson First Call. Revenue jumped 24% to $70.69 billion, although oil and gas production rose only 1.4%.

Anglo-Dutch company Royal Dutch/Shell said it earned $4 billion, compared with $2.6 billion in the same period a year earlier.

After stripping out the fluctuating value of Shell’s oil and gas inventories, the company said its adjusted earnings would have been $3.77 billion, a 16% increase from a year earlier. Sales rose 8% to $62.5 billion.

Shares of Exxon Mobil rose 22 cents to $46.03 -- near their 52-week high of $46.82 -- on the New York Stock Exchange.

Shell also announced that it would pay a $120-million civil penalty to settle an inquiry by the Securities and Exchange Commission into the downgrading of the company’s reserves.