France’s TotalEnergies said Thursday its second-quarter earnings increased, boosted by higher oil and gas prices, while the energy giant’s LNG sales also improved when compared to the same period last year.
Adjusted net income surged to $3.46 billion from $126 million last year. It also improved on the previous quarter by 20 percent.
The company posted a net profit of $2.21 billion, compared to a net loss of $8.37 billion last year.
TotalEnergies expects to generate more than $25 billion in cash flow this year.
The company’s chief executive Patrick Pouyanne said “the board of directors decided to allocate up to 40% of the additional cash flow generated above $60 per barrel to share
buybacks.”
In addition, LNG sales increased 1 percent to 10.5 million tonnes when compared to the same period last year but they also increased from 9.9 million tonnes in the first quarter.
TotalEnergies said sales rose despite a 3 percent decrease in hydrocarbon production for LNG. The shutdown of Equinor’s Hammerfest LNG plant in Norway and the planned maintenance shutdown on the Inpex-operated Ichthys plant in Australia affected the production, according to TotalEnergies.
Also, the company said earlier this month its average price for equity LNG sales in the second quarter reached $6.59/MMBtu, logging a rise when compared to the previous three-month period but also year-on-year.
The average LNG price benefitted from the lag effect of rising oil prices in long-term oil-linked contracts and from the increase in natural gas prices for spot gas price LNG contracts, TotalEnergies said.