The Shell petrol station is at 106 Old Brompton Road in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, London, England, United Kingdom, on December 25, 2025.
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British oil major Shell on Thursday reported its weakest quarterly profit in nearly five years, amid a weaker crude price environment and unfavorable tax adjustments in the fourth quarter.
Shell posted adjusted earnings of $3.26 billion for the quarter, missing analyst expectations of $3.53 billion, according to an LSEG-compiled consensus. A separate, company-provided analyst forecast had put Shell’s expected fourth-quarter profit at $3.51 billion.
It marks Shell’s weakest quarterly result since the first three months of 2021, when adjusted earnings came in at $3.2 billion.
For the full-year 2025, Shell posted weaker-than-expected adjusted earnings of $18.5 billion, compared to annual profit of $23.72 billion a year earlier.
“2025 was a year of accelerated momentum, with strong operational and financial performance across Shell,” Shell CEO Wael Sawan said in a statement.
The company announced a 4% increase in its dividend to $0.372 per share and a $3.5 billion share buyback program, a move that marks the 17th consecutive quarter of $3 billion or more in buybacks.
Net debt came in at $45.7 billion at the end of last year, with gearing at 20.7%. This reflects an increase from net debt of $41.2 billion and gearing of 18.8% at the end of the third quarter.
The results come as lower oil prices force European energy majors to confront some tough choices.
A challenging market environment, along with expectations for a particularly weak earnings season, had been expected to put the industry’s shareholder payouts at risk.
Norway’s Equinor was the first mover in this sense. The state-backed energy company announced hefty cuts to share buybacks on Wednesday after posting a 22% drop in fourth-quarter profit.
Equinor said it would reduce share buybacks to $1.5 billion this year, down from $5 billion last year, while also trimming investments in its renewables and low-emission energy projects.
Britain’s BP and France’s TotalEnergies are both scheduled to report fourth-quarter earnings next week.
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