The company reported full-year revenues of $US48.6 billion ($A59.1 billion) for 2014, a 7% increase year-on-year, while its revenues for the fourth quarter continued the trend, increasing 6% to $12.6 billion.
The company credited its escalated revenues to efficiency improvements in North America and better-than-expected drilling activity in the Middle East and Asia.
Dampening the news was the decline in profits by $1.66 billion to $302 million, a major contributor being the company’s restructuring efforts which led to a reduced headcount and other operational changes to counter the slumping oil price.
“In this uncertain environment, we continue to focus on what we can control,” Schlumberger CEO Paal Kibsgaard said.
“We have already taken a number of actions to restructure and resize our organisation that has led us to record a number of charges in the fourth quarter. We are convinced that performance must now be driven by an accelerated change in the way we work through our transformation program.
“The delivery of new technology that improves the performance of our customers’ reservoirs; the increases in efficiency and reliability that reduce overall finding, development and production costs; and the opportunities for growth from more integration—are all significant drivers of our own and our customers’ performance.
“Tangible results have already been recorded and, as we accelerate the benefits of the transformation program across both Technologies and GeoMarkets in 2015, we believe we are well-placed to outperform.”
Despite the overall slowdown in the oilfield market, North America turned out to be a main driver for the Houston-based company, with a 16% rise in revenues over the full year and fourth quarter revenue growing 2% from the September quarter to $4.3 billion.
“The strength of these results demonstrated the resiliency of our business portfolio in the face of activity challenges in 2014 in Brazil, Mexico, and China; reduced spending in deepwater, exploration and seismic activity; unrest in Libya and Iraq; international sanctions in Russia; and the accelerating fall in the price of oil toward the end of the year,” Kibsgaard said.
The company’s European/Commonwealth Independent States/Africa segment saw revenue fall 7% thanks to weakness in the Russian ruble and seasonal activity decline in that area.
Rig count declines led to less activity in Angola, Norway and the UK for the company.
On the bright side for shareholders, the board approved a 25% increase in dividends, effective April 10 – an announcement which saw a slight increase in the company’s stock price.
