RTTNews | Feb 22, 2021 05:21PM EST

17:20 Monday, February 22, 2021 (RTTNews.com) - Marathon Oil Corp. (MRO) Monday reported a fourth-quarter loss that was narrower than Wall Street analysts' estimates, helped by lower expenses. However, revenues fell short of expectations.

Houston, Texas-based Marathon Oil reported fourth-quarter loss of $338 million or $0.43 per share, wider than last year's loss of $20 million or $0.03 per share.

Adjusted net loss for the quarter was $98 million or $0.12 per share. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters estimated a loss of $0.20 per share.

Fourth-quarter revenues dropped to $830 million from $1.22 billion last year. Analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $838.05 million for the quarter.

Chairman, President, and CEO Lee Tillman said, "We reduced our cash costs by more than 20%, protected our investment grade balance sheet, reduced our gross debt, meaningfully improved our GHG emissions intensity, and ultimately generated about $280 million of free cash flow."

Total costs and expenses for the quarter dropped to $1.08 billion from $1.14 billion last year, with general and administrative costs down 23%. Cost saving measures included salary reductions for the board and certain corporate officers, as well as employee and contractor workforce reductions.

U.S. production averaged 280,000 net barrels of oil equivalent per day (boed) for fourth quarter.

Marathon Oil also announced a $1.0 billion capital expenditure budget for 2021.

MRO closed Monday's trading at $10.20, up $0.75 or 7.94%, on the Nasdaq. The stock further gained $0.20 or 1.91% in the after-hours trade.

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