Schlumberger turned a profit in the second quarter as drilling activity continued to rebound from the pandemic-driven oil bust.
The Paris and Houston-based oil-field services giant on Friday said it made a $431 million (£314m) profit in the three months ended June 31, compared with a $3.4 billion (£2.5bn) loss a year earlier. Revenue grew 5 percent to $5.6bn (£4bn), up from nearly $5.4bn (£3.9bn) a year earlier.
“The quarter marks a leap forward in achieving our full-year financial targets with potential for further upside given the right conditions,” Schlumberger CEO Olivier Le Peuch said in a statement.
Oil-field services giants such as Halliburton, Schlumberger and Baker Hughes are benefiting from increasing drilling and completion activity in North America as business and travel picks up with the rollout of COVID vaccinations.
Drillers have added 133 rigs so far this year as crude prices have recovered to $66 a barrel, up from less than $48 a barrel in January. Employment in the oil-field services sector rose by an estimated 8,000 jobs, or 1.3 percent in June, the fourth consecutive month of growth, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics analyzed by Houston trade group Energy Workforce & Technology Council.
Schlumberger said its North America revenue grew 11 percent in the second quarter, compared to the first quarter. The increase was driven by higher drilling activity and increased sales of well and surface production systems, the company said. U.S. land revenue grew 19 percent and well construction revenue grew more than 30 percent from the first quarter.
The company’s international revenue grew 7 percent in the second quarter, compared to the first quarter. Schlumberger said it expects its international revenue to grow in the second half of the year by double-digits, as long as there aren’t any setbacks in the pandemic recovery.
“While the rise of the COVID-19 Delta variant and resurgence of related disruptions could impact the pace of economic reopening, industry projections of oil demand reflect the anticipation of a wider vaccine-enabled recovery, improving road mobility, and the impact of various economic stimulus programs,” Le Peuch said. “Under this scenario, we believe the momentum of international activity growth that we experienced in the second quarter will continue as the cyclical recovery unfolds.”
This article first appeared on the Houston Chronicle – an Energy Voice content partner. For more from the Houston Chronicle click here.
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