Royal Dutch Shell met expectations with a 3 per cent rise in current cost of supply (CCS) net profit for the fourth quarter amid high oil prices and strong refining margins.
Shell said today that CCS profit, which excludes unrealised inventory gains, rose to $5.395 billion.
Excluding a net gain of $34 million related to exceptional items, the figure was in line with an average forecast of $5.385 billion in a poll of 10 analysts.
"Clean" net income - which is after exceptionals and inventory gains and is the figure viewed by analysts as the best measure of an oil firm's underlying health - was up around 13 per cent compared with the same period last year.
However some analysts had hoped for better after larger rival Exxon Mobil reported better-than-expected fourth-quarter results and a record $36 billion annual profit earlier this week.
Production fell to 3.5 million barrels of oil equivalent per day in the quarter from 3.84 million boepd in the same period of 2004, partly because hurricanes hit production in the Gulf of Mexico in the past two quarters.
Shell said it expected to return $5 billion to shareholders by repurchasing stock in 2006, in line with last year's share repurchases.
