Canada’s Imperial Oil posts smaller quarterly loss

Imperial Oil Ltd reported a smaller second-quarter loss as Canada's No.2 integrated oil producer and refiner benefited from a surge in oil prices.

North American oil producers are slowly gaining from a jump in global crude prices as an OPEC-led production cut and a rebound in demand slowly erode a global glut.

The company said crude oil prices jumped 43.2 percent to C$51.62 per barrel compared to the year-ago period. The company sold bitumen from its Canadian oil sands projects for C$38.22 per barrel compared with C$29.45 per barrel.

Imperial Oil, majority owned by Exxon Mobil Corp , said gross production rose slightly to 331,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boepd) in the reported quarter, compared with 329,000 boepd last year.

The company posted a net loss of C$77 million ($61.42 million), or 9 Canadian cents per share, in the quarter ended June 30, from C$181 million, or 21 Canadian cents, a year earlier.

Revenue rose 12.6 percent to C$7.03 billion.

(Reporting by Anirban Paul in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur and Shounak Dasgupta)