Chevron needs more gas in the tank after 27% fall in profits

The US major's figures were worse than expected, but the company is pushing forward with gas

Stein's Law - named after the economist Herbert Stein - states that if something can't go on forever, it will stop. So Chevron found to its cost in the first quarter, when natural gas prices finally rose after bumping along near 10-year lows for five years, exposing the US major's reliance on crude oil production. On 2 May, Chevron revealed its net profit in the first quarter was down 27% from a year ago at $4.51 billion. This was worse than analysts had been predicting, and compared poorly with its two biggest US rivals, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips."Our first quarter earnings were down from a year ago," Chevron chief executive John Watson said in a statement, "primarily due to lower price