For quite some time, I published a series over at Seeking Alpha in which I tracked the performance of six selected large oil and gas stocks so that followers of this industry could get a quick idea of how the industry as a whole performed as well as be aware of any significant developments in the industry during that period. Admittedly, I allowed this series to fall to the wayside as I worked on several other projects and the industry lost favor with investors. I have since decided to revive this series given the recent global developments that have injected significant volatility into this market. 

ExxonMobil (XOM) 

ExxonMobil opened the week of September 5 (September 4 was Labor Day and a market holiday) at $76.64 per share and closed the week at $78.82 per share. This gives the stock a return of 2.84% over the week. The stock had a negative return last week, so clearly it improved somewhat. The majority of this gain appears to have been due to the price of oil as ExxonMobil had no significant news events over the past week, with the exception of the company reactivating its Baytown refinery in Texas on September 2. This refinery, capable of processing 560,000 barrels of oil per day was shut down due to Hurricane Harvey hitting the state. Although 560,000 barrels sounds like a lot, it only represents a small fraction of the oil consumed in the United States alone so it is unlikely that this alone was able to cause the stock to surge 2.84% in a week. 

Source: Fidelity Investments 

Chevron (CVX) 

Much like ExxonMobil, Chevron also delivered relatively solid gains to its investors over the past week. The stock opened the week at $109.36 per share and closed the week at $110.78 per share. This gives the stock a return of 1.30% over the week. Unlike ExxonMobil, Chevron's stock actually gained last week although the gain was nowhere near as dramatic as what the stock saw during the week of September 5 – September 8. 

Chevron saw no significant news over the past week, although on Thursday, September 7, several of its stations in Florida were accused of price gouging. The Florida Attorney General stated that her office received 45 independent complaints of price gouging, although Chevron itself said that it has no tolerance for price gouging. It is worth noting that many Chevron stations are independently owned and are not owned by the corporation itself. 

Source: Fidelity Investments 

BP (BP) 

As with many of its peers, BP shareholders also saw their stock gain during the week. On September 5, 2017, BP shares opened at $34.92 and rose to $35.32 by the end of the week. This represents a weekly gain of 1.15%. BP shares rose significantly last week, so this latest gain appears to simply be a continuation of last week's trend. 

BP likewise had very little in the way of significant news last week. The company has a few offshore platforms in the Gulf of Mexico and one of them, Thunder Horse, was evacuated in advance of Hurricane Irma. Also, on Thursday, BP revived talks with Reliance Industries to develop the NEC-25 offshore block in the Bay of Bengal, potentially with a $6 billion investment in India's offshore Krishna-Godavari basin. Talks are still progressing on this, however, so it is unlikely that it would have a significant impact on the price at this time. 

Source: Fidelity Investments 

Royal Dutch Shell (RDS-A, RDS-B) 

As with most of its peers, Royal Dutch Shell also saw its stock price increase last week. On September 5, 2017, RDS-A opened at $55.50 per share. By the end of the week, the stock had climbed to $56.55 per share. This represents a weekly gain of 1.89%, roughly in line with the peer companies already discussed. Shares of Royal Dutch Shell suffered a slight loss last week, so this latest gain represents a reversal of the shareholders' fortunes. 

Royal Dutch Shell had one significant event happen to it during the week. On Wednesday, September 6, 2017, Royal Dutch Shell opened its first service station in Mexico. The company expects that this will be the first of many gas stations that it opens in Mexico as it plans to spend at least $1 billion over the next few years to integrate itself into the Mexican fuel and service sector now that PEMEX no longer has a monopoly over the sector, due to a governmental overhaul. This might be worth keeping an eye on as Mexico has 11,400 gas stations, most of which are PEMEX-branded, so if Royal Dutch Shell can make significant inroads into this, it may result in significant profits. 

Source: Fidelity Investments 

Eni (E) 

Italian oil giant Eni saw worse performance than many of its peers, although the stock did still gain over the course of the week. On September 5, the company's stock opened at $31.92, climbed to $32.73 on Thursday, before ending the week at $32.26. This gives it a gain of 1.07% on the week. Eni's stock also gained last week, so this simply represents a continuation of the prior trend. 

Eni had no significant developments last week. Unlike many of the American majors, and even many large foreign companies, Eni has almost no operations in the United States so did not have to do an evacuation in advance of Hurricane Irma, nor did it suffer any damage to refineries in Texas as many of its peers did. 

Source: Fidelity Investments 

Statoil (STO) 

Norway's Statoil was one of the few oil companies to see its share price decline over the past week. This is somewhat surprising as Statoil saw more developments over the past week that should positively affect its forward outlook. On September 5, 2017, shares of Statoil opened at $19.11 and closed out the week at $18.96. This represents a loss of 0.85%, a small loss to be sure, but a loss nonetheless. Considering that the company's stock gained significantly last week, this is quite a disappointing performance. 

As already mentioned, Statoil had more positive developments over the past week than any of the other companies discussed in this update. The most significant of these is that the company acquired two participating licenses in offshore blocks in South Africa, one of which is an operatorship. Although the company has largely turned the corner with its exploration program in recent years, many investors are still concerned about the company's large presence in the aging fields of the North Sea. This represents a further attempt to acquire more resources in fresh areas and should these blocks contain oil it will be a positive for the company's future reserve development and production. 

In addition, on Wednesday, the largest oil field in Libya, Sharara, resumed production. This field is a joint venture between Libya's national oil company and several European companies, including Statoil. Thus, the restart of this field should provide a slight boost to Statoil's oil production and profits. 

Source: Fidelity Investments