New York diesel settles at $4.5875 a gallon; Chevron shares close at $231.46
Key Facts
The nearby-month low-sulfur diesel contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange settled at $4.5875 a gallon on October 29, 2026, and Chevron shares closed at $231.46 the same day. These figures offer a snapshot of the refined-fuel market and the stock price at the close of trading, while the latest company performance details available here are from the second quarter. In that quarter, the refining and marketing segment posted earnings of $4.9 billion, compared with $737 million in the same period of 2025, according to Chevron's quarterly filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company attributed the increase mainly to higher refined-product margins. Chevron also reported quarterly earnings of $12.1 billion on July 31, including adjusted earnings of $12.0 billion, or $6.06 per diluted share, according to its official results.
The improvement in downstream operations was notably supported by U.S. activity: U.S. downstream earnings rose by $2.0 billion from the second quarter of 2025. Chevron said the increase was mainly tied to stronger margins on refined-product sales, which added $1.7 billion, and a $290 million increase in earnings from its affiliate CPChem. Chevron owns 50% of CPChem, according to the quarterly report. Operationally, the company's U.S. refineries recorded a record crude unit throughput, with capacity utilization at 97% in the second quarter. That puts the performance of U.S. refineries in the context of higher segment earnings, while third-quarter figures are not available among the documented facts here.
By contrast, Chevron's international refinery inputs fell by 63,000 barrels per day, or 10%, in the second quarter compared with the same period a year earlier. The company attributed the decline to supply disruptions caused by the Middle East conflict. The drop highlights the divergence between record performance at U.S. refineries and lower international inputs over the same period. On the production side, Chevron's average global output of oil equivalent was 3.97 million barrels per day in the first half of 2026, up 18% year over year. The company attributed production growth to the Hess acquisition and higher output in the Permian Basin and the Gulf of America.
The company said in its second-quarter earnings summary that global production rose 20% from a year earlier, with record U.S. production. In the first quarter, adjusted earnings were $1.41 per share, topping Wall Street expectations of 92 cents a share, according to The Associated Press. That comparison puts the first-quarter result in the context of the company's performance in 2026, without establishing third-quarter expectations. Across the energy market, an Associated Press report said about 20% of the world's oil typically passes through the Strait of Hormuz, and transit has been disrupted since the war began in late February 2026. That gives the supply disruption broader significance for the energy market, while the diesel contract's movement on October 29 and Chevron's share price in the same session remain the market indicators available for this report.
In the United States, the average gasoline price was $4.39 a gallon on Friday, up more than 8% over the week, according to an Associated Press report citing the American Automobile Association (AAA). The increase comes amid the energy-market disruption cited in the report, alongside the interruption of transit through the Strait of Hormuz. These figures provide context for fuel-price movements, but do not by themselves determine the reason the diesel contract settled at $4.5875 a gallon. Second-quarter figures also do not establish how much refining margins contributed to results in any subsequent period. The later date specified in the available facts is the July 31 announcement of second-quarter results.