Chevron posted a $725mn loss in the first quarter, including a $1.46bn upstream loss amid a 35pc plunge in crude prices and lower refining margins.
The integrated's downstream business posted a fall in profit, to $735mn from $1.42bn a year earlier. Chevron had posted a net profit $2.5bn a year earlier.
"Our downstream operations continued to perform well, although overall industry conditions and margins this quarter were weaker than a year ago," chief executive John Watson said in a statement.
US upstream losses nearly doubled to $850mn compared to $460mn a year earlier.
It earned an average price of $26/bl on its crude and natural gas liquids (NGL) in first quarter,
down from $43/bl a year ago. Natural gas sales averaged $1.32/Mcf compared with $2.27/Mcf a year earlier.
The non-US upstream business posted a loss of $609mn compared with a profit $2.02bn. It earned an average price of $29/bl on its crude oil and natural gas liquids (NGLs) in first quarter, down from $46 a year earlier. Natural gas price was $3.91/Mcf versus $5.01/Mcf a year earlier.
Worldwide output fell marginally to 2.67mn b/d of oil equivalent (boe/d) compared with 2.68mn boe/d as increases in project ramp-ups in the US, Nigeria and were offset by the continued shut-in
at an oilfield in the Partitioned Zone, shared between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait,
and normal field declines. Of that, US output rose to 701,000 boe/d, up 2,000 boe/d from a year earlier. Output increases from project ramp-ups in the Gulf of Mexico, the Marcellus shale basin in Pennsylvania and the Permian in Texas were mostly offset by maintenance-related downtime in the Gulf of Mexico, normal field declines and the effect of asset sales.
The major's cash flow from operations in the first quarter fell to $1.1bn from $2.3bn a year earlier, while capital expenditure (capex) fell to $6.5bn compared with $8.6bn a year earlier. Of that, spending in the upstream was 92pc of the total in the first quarter. Upstream spending in the US fell to $1.28bn from $2.32bn a year earlier, while international upstream capex fell to $4.69bn from $5.84bn a year earlier.
