By Ken Cohen
Exxon Mobil Perspectives

Big numbers make headlines – like our announcement of $10.7 billion in earnings for the first quarter of 2011. What may not make the headlines is the context surrounding that number, so I thought I would share with you what I told reporters following the announcement:

We understand that it’s simply too irresistible for many politicians in times of high oil prices and high earnings – they feel they have to demonize our industry.

Predictably last week the Administration established a task force to investigate oil and gas markets, now a time-honored tradition when prices increase.

And we’re seeing a return to the now-familiar misinformation about the oil industry’s taxes.

Over the last week as earnings season has approached, the Democratic Party leadership again talked about removing what they call $4 billion in oil industry subsidies. But what they really mean is that they want to increase our taxes by taking away long-standing deductions for our industry while leaving these same deductions in place for other sectors of the economy. The simple truth is that these are legitimate tax provisions to keep U.S. industry internationally competitive – to keep jobs from being exported to other countries.

Unfortunately, this false discussion about oil industry subsidies also reinforces another falsehood making the rounds: that ExxonMobil doesn’t pay its fair share of income taxes in the United States.

Let me state it unequivocally. Last year, our total taxes and duties to the U.S. government were $9.8 billion, which includes an income tax expense of $1.6 billion. Over the past five years, we incurred a total U.S. tax expense of almost $59 billion, which is $18 billion more than we earned in the United States during the same period.

And during the first quarter of this year, we incurred tax expenses in the United States of more than $3.1 billion on U.S. earnings of $2.6 billion.

So we have seen the predictable political positioning but no action to actually help bring down energy prices. In fact the government has chosen not to help increase supply by refusing to open up the vast energy resources in this country that are off limits to our industry.

Continue reading here.
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Exxon Mobil Profit Nears $11 Billion, Beats Target
By Steve Gelsi
Market Watch

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Exxon Mobil Corp. said Thursday its first-quarter profit rose to $10.65 billion, or $2.14 a share, from $6.3 billion, or $1.33 a share, in the year-ago period. Revenue rose to $114 billion, from $90.3 billion. Wall Street analysts expected Exxon Mobil to earn $2.04 a share on revenue of $112.6 billion, according to a survey by FactSet Research. “Exxon Mobil’s earnings reflect continued leadership in operational performance during a period of strong commodity prices,” the company said.