generic Chevron's 4th-Quarter Profit Falls Short of Projections
Chevron Corp. (NYSE:CVX) recently disappointed investors with its fourth-quarter earnings, reporting just $2.56 in earnings per share instead of the $3.12 that analysts had predicted.
Revenue, however, finished higher than expected, reaching $48.13 billion rather than $45.69 billion. This wasn't enough to salvage market sentiment, though, as the oil giants stock dropped by over 4% at the start of trading on Friday, just one day after hitting its all-time record high.
For full-year 2021, the San Ramon, California-based company set a record for free cash flow at $21.1 billion, and cut its debt by $12.9 billion, management said. The company earned $15.6 billion for the year compared to a net loss of $5.5 billion in 2020. Cash flow from operations reached $29.2 billion in 2021, more than double 2020?s total of $10.6 billion.
On Wednesday, Chevron increased its quarterly dividend by 6%, or about 8 cents, to $1.42 per share, marking the 35th consecutive year that it has upped its shareholder payout.
For the fourth quarter, the company reported net earnings of $5.1 billion ($2.63 per share) compared with a net loss of $665 million ($0.33 per share) in the fourth quarter of 2020. Sales and other operating revenues in the fourth quarter of 2021 were $46 billion compared to $25 billion in the year-ago period.
In 2021, we delivered record free cash flow and accelerated our progress towards a lower carbon future, said Mike Wirth, Chevrons Chairman and CEO. Were an even better company than we were just a few years ago. Were more capital- and cost-efficient, enabling us to return more cash to shareholders.
During 2021, Chevron increased its quarterly dividend per share by 4% to $1.34 and repurchased $1.4 billion of company stock, all while increasing return on capital employed to 9.4% and reducing debt by $12.9 billion, the release noted.
In 2021, the company made progress to advance its lower carbon future as it set targets to lower the carbon intensity of its operations, adopted a 2050 net zero aspiration for upstream scope 1 and 2 emissions, expanded its renewable fuels business, formed the Chevron New Energies organization that aims to grow hydrogen, carbon capture and offsets businesses, and tripled its associated planned capital investment to approximately $10 billion through 2028.
Also last year, the company and its affiliates further strengthened its businesses by advancing the Future Growth Project and Wellhead Pressure Management Project in Kazakhstan and the Anchor Project in the Gulf of Mexico, integrating legacy Noble Energy people and assets while realizing more than double the initially announced synergies, signing an agreement to extend Block 0 concession in Angola, and starting up the olefins mixed-feed cracker and associated polyethylene units in South Korea.
At year-end, balances of cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities totaled $5.7 billion, a slight increase from the end of 2020. Total debt as of Dec. 31, 2021 was $31.4 billion, a decrease of $12.9 billion from a year earlier.
Were delivering greater value to stockholders today, while working to meet the worlds growing energy demands in a lower carbon future, Wirth concluded.
This article first appeared on GuruFocus.
