Big Oil rakes in record profit haul of nearly $200 billion, fueling calls for higher taxes
Deer graze inside the gates of the Exxon Mobil Joliet refinery on the Des Plaines River. Exxon Mobil’s 2022 haul of $56 billion marked a historic high for the Western oil industry.
Chicago Tribune | Tribune News Service | Getty Images
The West’s five largest oil companies raked in combined profits of nearly $200 billion in 2022, intensifying calls for governments to impose tougher windfall taxes.
French oil giant TotalEnergies on Wednesday reported full-year profit of $36.2 billion, doubling last year’s total, as fossil fuel prices soared following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The results see TotalEnergies join supermajors Exxon Mobil, Chevron, BP and Shell in recording a massive upswing in annual profits, after Exxon’s 2022 haul of $56 billion marked a historic high for the Western oil industry.
Altogether, the five Big Oil companies reported combined profits of $196.3 billion last year, more than the economic output of most countries.
Flush with cash, the energy giants have used their bumper earnings to reward shareholders with higher dividends and share buybacks.
“You may have noticed that Big Oil just reported record profits,” U.S. President Joe Biden said in his State of the Union address on Tuesday. “Last year, they made $200 billion in the midst of a global energy crisis. It’s outrageous.”
Biden said U.S. oil majors invested “too little of that profit” to ramp up domestic production to help keep gas prices down. “Instead, they used those record profits to buy back their own stock, rewarding their CEOs and shareholders.”
Biden proposed quadrupling the tax on corporate stock buybacks to incentivize long-term investments, insisting the supermajors would still make a “considerable” profit.
Activists from Greenpeace set up a mock-petrol station price board displaying the Shell’s net profit for 2022 as they demonstrate outside the company’s headquarters in London on Feb. 2, 2023.
Daniel Leal | Afp | Getty Images
Agnès Callamard, secretary general of human rights group Amnesty International, described Big Oil’s vast profits as “patently unjustifiable” and “an unmitigated disaster.”
“The billions of dollars of profits being made by these oil corporations must be adequately taxed so that governments can address effectively the rising cost of living for most vulnerable populations and better protect human rights in the face of multiple global crises,” Callamard said in a statement.
Big Oil executives have sought to defend their rising profits amid a barrage of criticism from campaigners, typically highlighting the importance of energy security in the transition to renewables and suggesting higher taxes could deter investment.
“Ultimately, taxes are a matter for governments to decide on. We, of course, engage and provide perspectives and the key perspective that we try to provide is a context around the fact that companies like ourselves that need to invest multiple billion dollars to support the energy transition require a secure and stable investment climate,” Shell CEO Wael Sawan said Thursday.
His comments came shortly after Shell reported its highest-ever annual profit of nearly $40 billion, comfortably surpassing its previous record of $28.4 billion in 2008.
“For example, windfall taxes or price caps simply erode confidence in that investment stability and so I do worry about some of the moves being made,” Sawan said. “I think there is a different approach that needs to be had which is to really draw investment capital at a time when we need to be able to embed energy security into the broader energy system here in Europe.”
The CEO of Saudi Aramco, the world’s largest energy company, has previously warned about the dangers of pressuring oil companies through higher taxes.
Asked by CNBC’s Hadley Gamble last month if a windfall tax on oil profits was a bad idea, Saudi Aramco’s Amin Nasser replied, “I would say, it’s not helpful for them [in order] to have additional investment. They need to invest in the sector, they need to grow the business, in alternatives and in conventional energy, and they need to be helped.”
Nasser said the transition to renewable technologies required significant investment, and this is likely to take a hit if companies face increased taxation.
Nonetheless, the advocacy group Global Witness says people have every right to be outraged by the extraordinary profits of Big Oil and called for an increased windfall tax.
“Given that we’re entering a global recession and that most of us know people who are struggling, we must all call out profiteering like this,” Alice Harrison, fossil fuels campaign leader at Global Witness, told CNBC via email.
“An increased windfall tax to help those struggling to pay their bills, along with a significant boost in renewable energy and home insulation, would end the fossil fuel era that is harming both people and the planet so severely,” Harrison said.
‘People can see the injustice’
“People can see the injustice of paying eye-watering energy costs while big oil and gas firms rake in billions,” said Sana Yusuf, climate campaigner at Friends of the Earth.
“Fairly taxing their excess profits could help to fund a nationwide programme of insulation and a renewable energy drive, which would lower bills, keep homes warmer and reduce harmful carbon emissions,” Yusuf said.
BP CEO Bernard Looney on Tuesday sought to defend the company from criticism after reporting record 2022 profits of $27.7 billion, saying the British energy major was “leaning in” to its strategy to provide the world with the energy it needs.BP, which was one of the first energy giants to announce an ambition to cut emissions to net zero by 2050, had pledged emissions would be 35% to 40% lower by the end of the decade.
It said Tuesday, however, that it was now targeting a 20% to 30% cut, saying it needed to keep investing in oil and gas to meet demand.
“We’re leaning into our strategy today,” BP’s Looney said. “We’re announcing up to $8 billion more investment into the energy transition this decade and up to $8 billion more into oil and gas in support of energy security and energy affordability this decade.”
Activist investor group Follow This was sharply critical of the move.
“If the bulk of your investments remain tied to fossil fuels, and you even plan to increase those investments, you cannot maintain to be Paris-aligned, because you will not achieve large-scale emissions reductions by 2030,” said Mark van Baal, founder of Follow This.
— CNBC’s Natasha Turak contributed to this report.
No matter how badly a fleet wants to electrify their operations and take advantage of reduced fuel costs and TCO, the fact remains that there are substantial up-front obstacles to commercial EV adoption … or are there? We’ve got fleet financing expert Guy O’Brien here to help walk us through it on today’s fiscally responsible episode of Quick Charge!
This conversation was motivated by the recent uncertainty surrounding EVs and EV infrastructure at the Federal level, and how that turmoil is leading some to believe they should wait to electrify. The truth? There’s never been a better time to make the switch!
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Vermont’s EV adoption has surged by an impressive 41% over the past year, with nearly 18,000 EVs now registered statewide.
According to data from Drive Electric Vermont and the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources, 17,939 EVs were registered as of January 2025, increasing by 5,185 vehicles. Notably, over 12% of all new cars registered last year in Vermont had a plug. Additionally, used EVs are gaining popularity, accounting for about 15% of new EV registrations.
To put it in perspective, Vermont took six years to register its first 5,000 EVs – and the last 5,000 were added in just the previous year.
Rapid growth, expanding infrastructure
In just two years, Vermont has doubled its fleet of EVs, underscoring residents’ enthusiasm for electric driving. To support this surge, the state now boasts 459 public EV chargers, including 92 DC fast chargers.
The EV mix in Vermont is leaning increasingly toward BEVs, which represent 60% of the state’s EV fleet. The remaining 40% consists of PHEVs, offering flexible fuel options for drivers.
Top EV models in Vermont
Vermont’s favorite EVs in late 2024 included the Hyundai Ioniq 5, Nissan Ariya, Toyota RAV4 Prime PHEV, Tesla Model Y, and the Ford F-150 Lightning. These vehicles have appealed to Vermont drivers looking for reliability, performance, and practical features that work well in Vermont’s climate.
Leading the US in reducing emissions
This strong adoption of EVs earned Vermont the top ranking from the Natural Resources Defense Council for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in transportation in 2023. “It’s only getting easier for Vermonters to drive electric,” noted Michele Boomhower, Vermont’s Department of Transportation director. She emphasized the growing variety of EV models, including electric trucks and SUVs with essential features like all-wheel drive, crucial for Vermont’s climate and terrain.
Local dealerships boost EV accessibility
Nucar Automall, an auto dealer in St. Albans, is a great example of local support driving this trend. With help from Efficiency Vermont’s EV dealer incentives – receiving $25,000 through the EV Readiness Incentive program – it recently installed 15 EV chargers for new buyers and existing drivers to use.
“Having these chargers on the lot makes it easier for customers to see just how simple charging an EV can be,” said Ryan Ortiz, general manager at Nucar Automall. Ortiz also pointed out the growing affordability of EVs, thanks to more models becoming available and an increase in pre-owned EVs coming off leases.
Read more: Vermont becomes the first US state to pass a law requiring Big Oil to pay for climate damage
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Elon Musk said Tesla’s self-driving will start contributing to the company’s profits… wait for it… “next year” with “millions of Tesla robotaxis in operation during the second half of the year.”
The claim has become a running joke, as he has made it for the last decade.
During Tesla’s conference call following the release of its Q1 2025 financial results, Musk updated shareholders about Tesla’s self-driving plans, which he again presented as critical to the company’s future.
He made a series of claims, mainly updating timelines about Tesla’s self-driving efforts.
Here are the main comments:
- The CEO reiterated that Tesla will launch its paid autonomous ride-sharing service in Austin in June.
- He did clarify that the fleet will consist of Model Y vehicles and not the new Cybercab.
- Musk also confirmed that Tesla is currently training a fleet specifically for Austin.
- As we previously reported, this internal ride-hailing fleet operating in a geo-fenced with teleoperation assist is a big change from Tesla’s approach.
- Musk said “10 to 20 vehicles” on day one.
- Musk said that Tesla’s self-driving will start contributing positively to the company financially in the middle of next year, and “There will be millions of Teslas operating autonomously in the second half of next year.”
- Musk has literally said something similar every year for the past decade and therefore, it’s hard to take him seriously.
- The CEO claimed that Tesla would get “a 90-something percentage market share” in the autonomous market.
- Musk again claimed that no one else is getting close to Tesla’s capacity, and he criticized Waymo for being too expensive.
- Musk is “confident” that the first Model Y will drive itself from the factory to a customer’s home later this year.
- The CEO said that he is confident that Tesla will deliver “unsupervised full self-driving” in consumer vehicles by the end of the year.
Despite Tesla missing earnings expectations by a wide margin, the company’s stock rose 4% in after-hours trading following Musk’s comments, indicating that shareholders still believe Musk’s self-driving predictions, despite his predictions having been incorrect for almost a decade.
Electrek’s Take
The first point I believe will happen. Tesla needs it to happen. It badly needs a win on the self-driving front.
However, as we previously explained, while Tesla will claim a win in June, it will be with a limited geo-fenced and teleoperation-assisted system that won’t scale to customer vehicles, which is what has been promised for years.
Tesla was even asked how it plans to launch this in Austin in June, when FSD in consumer vehicles currently requires frequent interventions from drivers, and Ashok, Tesla’s head of autonomous driving, admitted his team is currently focused on solving the intervention specifically related to driving in Austin.
With training on specific Austin routes and using teleoperations, Tesla can make that happen, but the road between that and unsupervised self-driving in consumer vehicles and “million of Tesla robotaxis” in the second of next year is a long one.
Basically, other than the first point, I believe Tesla will not achieve any of the other on anything close to the timelines announced by Musk today.
I’m willing to take bets on that.
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