[Sean]

http://money.cnn.com/2005/10/27/news...ex.htm?cnn=yes

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Exxon Mobil Corp., the world's largest publicly traded oil company, said Thursday quarterly profit surged 75 percent to nearly $10 billion, raking in a bonanza from record oil prices. The profit was the highest in the company's history, surpassing the record it set in the 2004 fourth quarter. Revenue jumped 32 percent to just over $100 billion. Two powerful hurricanes ripped through the Gulf of Mexico in the third quarter, disrupting energy operations in the region and sending oil prices and refining margins sharply higher. Exxon Mobil said net income rose to $9.9 billion, or $1.58 a share, in the third quarter from $5.68 billion, or 88 cents a share, a year earlier. Excluding a gain of $1.62 billion from restructuring its stake in a Dutch gas transportation business, earnings were $1.32 per share. On that basis, analysts' average forecast was $1.39, according to Reuters Estimates. Exxon (unchanged at $56.50, Research) shares rose slightly in pre-market trade. The company's oil and gas production fell 4.7 percent from a year earlier as outages caused by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, maintenance activities, and maturing fields more than offset higher production from new fields in West Africa.