Oil prices surged a dollar to $61 a barrel yesterday as US refinery fires and an oilfield outage in the North Sea underlined concerns about stretched global refining and crude production capacity.
US light crude for September delivery rose as high as $61.05 and was up 86 cents at $60.80 a barrel, close to a record price of $62.10 struck in early July.
London Brent crude gained 90 cents to $59.66 a barrel.
A fire on Thursday at BP's giant Texas City refinery forced it to shut a desulphurisation unit. The fire was brought under control yesterday morning. - (Reuters)
Oil firms report healthy Q2 profits
US oil firm Chevron and its takeover target Unocal both reported better-than-expected quarterly profit yesterday.
Chevron, which is locked in a battle with Chinese oil firm CNOOC to buy Unocal, needed to turn in a solid quarter to boost its chances of winning the smaller US oil firm, analysts said.
Chevron, the country's second biggest oil company and whose chief executive is Irishman David O'Reilly, said second-quarter profit fell 10 per cent as refinery outages and a sharp decline in oil and gas production outweighed a boost from soaring oil and gas prices.
But net income of $3.7 billion, or $1.76 a share, easily beat analysts' forecasts of $1.65 a share.
The firm earned $4.1 billion, or $1.94 a share, a year earlier.
Unocal's second-quarter earnings jumped to $475 million, or $1.73 a share, from $341 million, or $1.25 a share, a year earlier. - (Reuters)
Improved ratings for Irish insurers
Ratings service Standard & Poors raised its long term credit rating on the non-life insurers Allianz Ireland and Allianz Corporate Ireland yesterday.
The agency said the upgrades to the firm's ratings to BBB+ from BBB reflected improvements in the Irish insurance market following legislative reforms and a better operating performance.
Standard & Poors said the Irish insurance market had been through a period of reform since 2002 with fraudulent claims and spiralling compensation payouts addressed and the introduction of a penalty points system for motorists.
Firm's results beat expectations
Electronic Data Systems marked another stage in its turnaround by announcing second-quarter earnings substantially above Wall Street expectations and raising its guidance for the full year.
The information technology services group said net income in the three months to June would be $26 million, or 5 cents a share.
On pro-forma bases, excluding one-off items, net income will be $45m, or 9 cents. Analysts were expecting a pro-forma loss of 5 cents.
One reason for the improvement is that EDS will take a smaller than expected second-quarter charge to reflect problems with a large IT outsourcing contract.
Analysts had feared that a substantial proportion of the $166 million assets associated with the contract would be written down. But EDS said it would record a charge of only $37 million, or 5 cents a share.
IAWS structure change agreed
Shareholders in the IAWS Co-op, soon to be renamed One51, have formally agreed to a change in the company's structure that will allow it to start on a path to flotation.
The member co-ops voted on the change on Thursday.
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