BP (LON:BP) reported on Tuesday first-quarter earnings of $2.7 billion, down 40% from a year earlier and missing forecasts due to lower oil and gas prices and a U.S. refinery outage.
The London-based company held its dividend steady at 7.27 cents per share and maintained the rate of its share buyback programme at $1.75 billion over the next three months, similar to the previous period.
BP's first-quarter underlying replacement cost profit, the company's definition of net income, reached $2.7 billion, missing forecasts of $2.87 billion in a company-provided survey of analysts.
That compared with a $3 billion profit in the previous quarter and $5 billion a year earlier.
The results reflected lower energy prices and the impact of the Whiting refinery outage and a significantly weaker fuels margin, BP said. Those were partially offset by significantly lower level of turnaround activity at BP facilities as well as a strong oil trading result and higher realised refining margins.
