The jaw-dropping dimension of Large Oil’s newest quarterly earnings – nearly $31B combined by Exxon Mobil and Chevron – has revived calls from politicians and shopper teams to impose extra taxes on the businesses or prohibit gasoline exports.

Exxon Mobil (NYSE:XOM), Chevron (CVX), Shell (SHEL) and TotalEnergies (TTE) are paying nearly $100B to shareholders annually within the type of buybacks and dividends whereas reinvesting simply $80B of their core companies this 12 months, in response to Bloomberg.

President Biden and others have scolded oil corporations for his or her excessive earnings and accused them of gouging motorists, and the president singled out Exxon after Friday’s quarterly earnings launch for rewarding traders as a substitute of reducing gasoline costs.

“Cannot consider I’ve to say this, however giving earnings to shareholders shouldn’t be the identical as bringing costs down for American households,” Biden tweeted in response to Exxon’s newest dividend improve.

The president assailed Exxon once more Friday night time, saying “These extra earnings are going again to their shareholders and their executives as a substitute of going to decrease costs on the pump and giving aid to the American individuals, who deserve it and wish it.”

Senate Majority Chief Chuck Schumer referred to as the earnings “unconscionable,” and a California congressman looking for a technique to decrease costs on the pump introduced legislation Friday that would ban gasoline exports each time the home value over the prior seven days averages a minimum of $3.12/gal, which was the common value in 2019.

Executives at Exxon and Chevron, lastly producing sturdy outcomes after years of poor returns, look like in no temper to again down.

Exxon CEO Darren Woods devoted two pages of ready remarks throughout the firm’s earnings conference call detailing why the European Union’s windfall taxes on the power business will increase power costs for shoppers in the long term.

Chevron CFO Pierre Breber warned Friday that “taxing production will just reduce it… If you happen to increase prices on power producers, it’s going to lower funding in order that goes towards the intent of accelerating provides and making power extra reasonably priced.”

However Shell CEO Ben Van Beurden stated the power business ought to “embrace” the “societal reality” that it will face higher taxes to help struggling parts of society.