Wartime means boom times for Big Oil in America

First off, the rumor that I somehow profited by investing half my net worth in big oil prior to the war breaking out is categorically untrue. I do not profit from other's misfortunes (unless absolutely necessary).

I have been using Claude to track my earnings however.

Wartime means boom times for Big Oil in America

ExxonMobil and Chevron saw record quarterly earnings as they pushed to turn out more diesel and U.S. prices for the fuel reached all-time highs

By Cris Tolomia, Quartz News

Updated October 30, 2026

ExxonMobil posted record quarterly refining earnings on Friday as drone strikes on refineries in Russia and the Middle East disrupted fuel markets.

ExxonMobil reported third-quarter earnings of $15.4 billion, or $3.72 a share. Adjusted earnings were $17.5 billion, or $4.23 a share. Earnings rose 104% from a year earlier.

Chevron reported earnings of $9.9 billion, or $5.06 a share, compared with $3.5 billion in the year-earlier quarter. Adjusted earnings were $10.4 billion, or $5.28 a share. Chevron's downstream earnings were $4.9 billion, up from $1.1 billion a year earlier.

ExxonMobil's Energy Products segment earned $7.2 billion, up from $5.5 billion in the second quarter. The company said its U.S. Gulf Coast refineries had their crude units working at full utilization and turned out the second-largest volumes of diesel ever recorded at those sites.

Chevron's U.S. refineries set a record of 1.09 million barrels a day of crude throughput, with utilization at 98%. U.S. downstream earnings were $3.6 billion, compared with $638 million a year earlier.

Both companies are pushing to turn out more diesel, and U.S. prices for the fuel reached all-time highs in September. "The higher fuel prices clearly put real pressure on families and businesses, and the most meaningful response that we can make to higher global commodity prices is to pull every lever available to us to increase supply," Neil Hansen, ExxonMobil's chief financial officer, said, according to The Wall Street Journal.

ExxonMobil said it handed back $9.4 billion to its shareholders during the quarter by paying dividends and buying back stock. Chevron said it cut total debt by $3.5 billion in the quarter. Chevron stock gained roughly 2% before the opening bell on Friday, and ExxonMobil stock rose roughly 1.5%.

ExxonMobil said in a preliminary statement on Oct. 16 that higher refining margins added an estimated $4.5 billion to its third-quarter earnings. The Gulf Coast 3-2-1 crack spread, a gauge of U.S. refiner profitability, climbed 28% from the second quarter and peaked at an all-time high of $72.64 on Sept. 22.

The conflict began on Feb. 28, when the U.S. and Israel struck Iran. President Donald Trump in August demanded that the two companies cut retail gasoline prices after they reported second-quarter profits tied to the war. The companies and their trade groups have pushed back on price-gouging allegations.