Exxon’s record $56B profit sparks criticism

Lose money in 2020. Run typically on low margins. And people get upset when you make money.

Wish I had bought more when it was down. I had bought a bunch in the 80s before 2020 and watched it go all the way down to the low 30s. Picked up more while it was down. Great yield in those shares as well!

 

Isn't this how the market should work?

2020 - demand goes to 0 - prices collapse
2022 - demand soaring, supplies modestly reduced due to Russia - prices climb

Not sure why we need to "yell" at Joe Biden or the oil companies here?? (yes, I know that there is a lot more to it than my childish explanation above, but in its simplist description that his how the market should work).

 

All those retirement accounts and funds are also liking these profits…

 

"Making money" is a pretty low key way to describe a record $55 billion in profit, that's obscene under any circumstances. Hard to argue they weren't overcharging for gas.

 

The market should be boom and bust cycles?

 

If people are ok with this then they shouldn't complain about high gas prices. They're just making money, right?

 

Don't Alaskan citizens receive a check from oil proceeds based on the rationale that oil is a public resource? Should something like that be applied in other states and/or nationally?

 

How do you propose gas prices be set?

I don’t think most of the money is made at the gas pump. The extra profit is made by extracting oil at a cost much lower than the high price of oil which is market based.

 

I found the commie!

 

Its primary allegiance is not to the consumer, but to the shareholders and board members. That's both the strength and weakness of capitalism. The weakness could be ameliorated if our tax code could be completely overhauled, or at least many deductions eliminated or modified. That's not going to happen with this Congress, or any Congress for that matter. Lobbyists + corrupt politicians LESS campaign finance reform run the country. That is the true "deep state", not the FBI, CIA or regulatory agencies as the far right would have us believe.

 

We listen to LA local news on Pluto every morning because our daughter is out there. I was a little bit surprised at their segment this morning on the anticipation of rising gas prices, they specifically went into the record profits of the oil companies, just as part of the local news presentation. I didn't think local news could ever run afoul of the business community and survive

 

Well said, although I think that there many instances of corporate management showing class consciousness over desire to maximize shareholder benefits, especially if you get into a short-term versus long-term calculation.

But I also put a different twist on that. What do you call it the market, or capitalism, which are actually distinct but the same for these purposes, the market serves man; man doesn't serve the market. Corporations are by definition amoral as you describe. But they are also creatures of the state. And it is the state, as the instrument of collective moral expression, that must impose a code of ethics. I get very angry when corporations, whom Samuel Alito says are just people, object to being morally limited

 

Gas and oil pricing (fixing) is SOP for energy companies. Even that Faux thug Bill O'Reilly used to yammer on about it and he is an apologist for the industry.

Totally corrupt!

 

You can credit Joe Biden directly for Exxon's profits.
He has a fundamental misunderstanding of markets and capitalism.

 

Not to the shareholders.

 

Well damn that's insightful, what do you think of the shareholders of Phizer making out like bandits during COVID?

 

They are enjoying it for sure. Unlike Covid thought…oil is valuable resource that enhances people’s lives. The shots are a different story. If we made people pay for the shots instead of subsidizing them on the taxpayers back…the shareholders would not be enjoying the windfall.