Bloomberg / Getty ImagesProfits at BP have surged to the highest since 2022 after the war in the Middle East pushed up oil prices.
The oil giant reported a profit of $5.73bn (£4.26bn) between April and June. That was more than double the $2.35bn made a year earlier and the highest quarterly profit since 2022 when the Russia-Ukraine war began.
The price of crude oil has jumped since the outbreak of the Iran war earlier this year due to major disruption to global supplies of oil and gas through the Strait of Hormuz.
Environmental and poverty campaigners blasted BP for “profiteering” off skyrocketing oil prices.
BP said Brent crude – the global benchmark for oil prices – averaged $103.85 a barrel in the April-to-June quarter, up from $67.88 in the same period last year.
The rise in the oil price has benefited all energy companies, not just BP, with rival Shell also reporting a doubling in quarterly profits last week.
On Monday, US President Donald Trump said American oil firms ExxonMobil and Chevron were “making too much money”.
He told reporters: “I don’t like it, and I should be the last one to say because I’m a big free enterprise guy.
“They ought to give some of that back to the public, and they better cut the retail price, the consumer price.”
Despite the big rise in profits, BP chief executive Meg O’Neill said the company was not reaching its full potential.
BP, which employs nearly 14,000 people in the UK, confirmed plans to move further away from clean energy, revealing plans to sell off its US renewable natural gas business Archaea.
O’Neill said this was part of her plan to prioritise “value, not sentiment or history”.
“We have to focus on the assets with the strongest potential to deliver competitive returns and long-term value,” she said.
Last week, BP announced it was putting its North Sea business up for sale in a move that would end 60 years of production in the region by the company.
Russ Mould, investment director at AJ Bell, said the sell-offs intended to make the business more streamlined.
“O’Neill will be aware she cannot rely on oil and gas prices remaining this high indefinitely,” he said.
“She needs to make sure it can prosper even when the backdrop is less helpful.”
The bumper profits reported by oil companies have led to an angry response from campaign groups.
Angharad Hopkinson, from environmental group Greenpeace, said BP’s results showed that “corporate gains have become entirely divorced from the public good”.
She said “the one point on which we agree with BP” is its decision to sell off its North Sea operations.
“Prolonging this parasitic relationship by trying to squeeze the last few drops of expensive oil out of the North Sea is sheer folly,” Hopkinson said.
Simon Francis, co-ordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, said oil firms “have banked more billions from a crisis that has created real hardship for millions of households”.
“The lesson is not to hand yet more tax breaks to an industry posting billions in profit every quarter, but to use Windfall Tax receipts to clear the record energy debt households built up during the crisis,” he said.
Energy firms operating in the UK are subject to a windfall tax – called the Energy Profits Levy – that was introduced in 2022.
However, the tax only applies to profits made from extracting oil and gas in the UK.
