Exxon Profit Doubles to USD 14.5 Billion but Misses EPS on Refining Volatility as Chevron Beats

ExxonMobil doubled second-quarter profit to USD 14.5 billion on revenue of USD 116 billion, yet earnings per share landed slightly below analyst estimates, with the company attributing the gap to volatility in its refining business. Chevron went the other way, posting net profit of USD 12 billion, close to five times the year-earlier level, with revenue of USD 70 billion above analyst estimates and adjusted earnings per share ahead of market expectations.

The split matters for how investors read the quarter. Both US majors reported sharply higher profit, according to CNBC, on higher crude and fuel prices following the escalation of the conflict between Iran and Israel. Only one of them converted that into a clean beat on the per-share line.

The price backdrop was unambiguous. US oil averaged USD 92.45 per barrel in the second quarter, 27% above the previous quarter. That move fed both the upstream barrel and the fuel prices behind the earnings jump.

Refining is where the two results diverge. ExxonMobil pointed to swings in that segment to explain why the per-share figure fell short even as headline profit doubled. Downstream margins move on crack spreads rather than on flat crude, so a quarter of rising benchmarks does not mechanically translate into refining strength.

Chevron chief executive Mike Wirth warned that the oil market remains under pressure, with the Middle East conflict having spread beyond the Strait of Hormuz and global crude inventories continuing to fall. That is a supply-side read on the same barrels that produced the quarter's numbers, and it is the sitting management view rather than a forecast from an outside house.

On revenue scale, ExxonMobil's USD 116 billion top line ran well ahead of the USD 70 billion Chevron booked, a gap consistent with the two companies' different portfolio weightings. Net profit narrowed that distance: USD 14.5 billion against USD 12 billion.

The year-on-year multiple is where Chevron stands out. Its net profit came in at close to five times the same period a year earlier. ExxonMobil's profit doubled over the comparable stretch. Both moves start from a much weaker prior-year base for the sector, and both were driven by the same price event.

The reporting was filed from New York on August 1, 2026, by Anca Dumitrescu, with the results attributed to CNBC.

For equity holders in the two largest US majors, the quarter sets up a familiar test. Upstream leverage to a crude spike is straightforward to model against a USD 92.45 per barrel average. Refining is not, and ExxonMobil has now named that segment as the reason its per-share result sat under consensus while its absolute profit doubled. Chevron cleared both the revenue and adjusted per-share bar in the same price environment.

Wirth's inventory comment is the forward-looking element management itself put on the record: crude stocks falling, conflict effects reaching past the Strait of Hormuz, and the market still under pressure. If global inventories keep drawing, the upstream half of the earnings equation holds. The refining half, on ExxonMobil's own account, remains the volatile piece.