KEY POINTS:
BP has agreed to pay US$303 million ($401 million) to settle charges that it had manipulated the propane gas market in the US in 2004.
News of the deal came hours after the oil giant revealed results that lived up to the warning by its chief executive, Tony Hayward, that they would be "dreadful".
The company posted a near 50 per cent drop in profit from US$6.9 billion in the third quarter of last year to US$3.8 billion this year.
The last time that BP's profits touched that level was in 2004, when the average oil price was less than half what it is now.
Chief financial officer Byron Grote blamed the slump on a litany of problems: falling refining margins, reduced capacity at refineries in Indiana and Texas, leaks that led to shutdowns in Alaska's Prudhoe Bay and production delays at new fields.
Yet he sought to paint the poor performance as a low point. From next year, he said, "you will see progressive improvement in underlying financial performance". Central to that effort will be the sweeping restructuring announced by Hayward earlier this month, under which thousands of jobs will be cut.
- Independent
