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May 8 (Reuters) – ConocoPhillips (COP.N) beat Wall Street estimates for first-quarter profit on Thursday and said Chief Financial Officer Bill Bullock will retire after nearly four decades with the oil and gas producer.
The company’s $22.5 billion acquisition of Marathon Oil in November has boosted ConocoPhillips’ presence in the Permian, Eagle Ford and Bakken basins, and added new operations in the Anadarko shale formation and Equatorial Guinea.
ConocoPhillips’ first-quarter production stood at 2.38 million barrels of oil equivalent per day (MMBOED), up 487,000 boepd from the year-ago quarter.
The higher output helped offset the impact of weak oil prices, which led to a 6% fall in the company’s total average realized price per barrel to $53.34.
The company is confident about its “competitive advantage” amid the ongoing “volatile macro environment,” CEO Ryan Lance said, and maintained its full-year production forecast at 2.34 to 2.38 MMBOED.
ConocoPhillips reduced its full-year capital budget by $450 million to $12.3 billion-$12.6 billion, but kept its $10 billion shareholder returns target for the year largely unchanged.
It spent $2.5 billion in shareholder returns in the quarter.
Shares of the Texas-based company were up 2.3%.
Investor focus will be on the company’s commentary regarding shareholder returns amid a weaker oil and macro environment, RBC Capital Markets analysts said in a note.
On an adjusted basis, ConocoPhillips reported a profit of $2.09 per share for the reported quarter, above analysts’ average estimate of $2.06, according to data compiled by LSEG.
Separately, ConocoPhillips said Andy O’Brien will succeed CFO Bullock, effective on June 1.
Bullock, 60, who joined the company in 1986, was appointed the finance head in 2020.
ConocoPhillips completed several big-ticket deals during his tenure, including the sale of assets in Australia to Santos Limited in 2020, the $9.7 billion acquisition of Concho Resources in 2021, and the most recent Marathon Oil acquisition.
Reporting by Mrinalika Roy in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli
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