Shell profits surge but war inflicts damage too | Money News

Shell has revealed a surge in quarterly profits on the back of the Middle East conflict but also given an update on costly war damage to its output.

The oil and gas firm reported net profits of $6.9bn (£5.1bn) for the first three months of the year.

The sum is more than double the result achieved between October and December 2025 and 24% higher on the same period last year.

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Like rival BP last week, Shell said the main boost to its bottom line came from oil trading, while profits in its chemicals and products business quadrupled.

The headline profits figure was higher than expected and reached despite elevated prices from the war only taking effect from March.

Before the US-Israeli attacks on Iran, on 28 February, a barrel of Brent crude for example stood at $72.

Futures prices have since peaked above $120. They currently stand at just over $100 amid the latest hopes a peace deal is within reach.

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Shell slowed the pace of its share buyback programme to £3bn (£2.2bn) but raised its dividend by 5%.

The rewards are good news for shareholders and most private pension funds but the profit levels were described as excessive by critics of fossil fuel producers.

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Shares fell by 1.8% at the open, in line with declines seen by BP also, but remain more than 15% higher in the year to date despite returning to near pre-war levels.

Unlike BP’s centres of operation, Shell is exposed to any hostilities in the Middle East, with the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar among Gulf states to have suffered damage from targeted attacks by Iran.

On 18 March, one of two major processing units caught fire at the company’s Pearl gas-to-liquid facility in Qatar, forcing a halt to production.

Shell later said it could take a year to repair the damage.

In its update on Thursday, the company guided that the repair bill come in below $500m and that it had been able to sell product stockpiles at the facility despite the attack.

Pearl can usually process ​up to 1.6 billion cubic feet per ​day of wellhead gas, converting it into 140,000 barrels of ‌gas-to-liquids including liquified petroleum gas.

The entire plant’s production remains offline but Shell said it would be able to restart the undamaged half once the Strait of Hormuz was fully reopened.

Its total gas production was expected to be down by almost a third in the current quarter due to war-linked disruption.

Iran’s effective closure of the crucial shipping lane means a fifth of the world’s oil and gas supplies are being prevented from delivery.