7 May 2024
If you are covering BP’s latest financial results, please find below a comment from Jamie Maddock, energy analyst at Quilter Cheviot:
“Ultimately the market is going to compare BP to Shell a lot at the moment, particularly as the latter is doing well in fairly volatile conditions. For BP however, this means slight misses in results leads to a slightly more overexaggerated reaction. Today’s results from BP were fairly uneventful in the grand scheme of things with its earnings and shareholder returns more or less as expected.
“Despite profits being lower than the market expected, BP has maintained its share buyback at $1.75bn for the quarter. This is positive and suggests it has confidence in its earnings going forward, despite the ups and downs of the commodity markets. Furthermore, the business is looking to make at least $2bn in cost savings by the end of 2026 as it looks to grapple with lower oil and gas prices compared with the past couple of years.
“These are still early days for CEO Murray Auchincloss as he looks to narrow the modest valuation gap with Shell but more so with US peers. BP is facing pressures on a few fronts, so unspectacular results will be welcomed until it is clear the business is in better shape.”
