Oil refiners and retailer Petron Corp. and Pilipinas Shell Petroleum Corp. are feeling the adverse effects of the global oil market?s volatility as profits fall short of expectations, company officials said.

Pilipinas Shell recorded a net income of P6.7 billion in the first three quarters, compared with P4.7 billion in the same period last year?but only because of a one-time gain of P3.0 billion from the sale of the company?s economic rights to the Shell trademark to Shell Brands International AG, Pilipinas Shell vice president Roberto Kanapi said.

Without the one-time gain, the three-quarter profit would have been P3.7 billion, he said.

Pilipinas Shell?s sales volume dropped 6.0 percent in the three quarters to 4.2 billion liters, Kanapi said.

Petron registered a 32.2-percent drop in three-quarter net income to P2.8 billion from P4.1 billion in the same period last year, company public affairs manager Virginia Ruivivar said.

In the third quarter, its profit fell 67.0 percent to P462 million from P1.4 billion a year earlier because of a contraction in margins, as pump prices fell faster than crude costs, she said.

Petron expects continued volatility in oil prices in the fourth quarter, Ruivivar said. ?We?ll end the year with a net loss. That?s what we project,? she said.

The lag in the reflection of international oil prices at the pump has caused Petron to accumulate under-recoveries over the past months, Ruivivar said.

Estimated inventory losses registered in the first half, for example, were enough to wipe out the company?s profit during the same period, she said.

The situation is not unique to Shell and Petron.

Finished-products importers Chevron Philippines Inc. and Eastern Petroleum Corp. are also feeling the pinch, company officials said.

?No one expected prices to go as high as they did, and no one expected prices to go down as fast as they did these past months. There are still losses that have to be recovered,? Chevron communications manager Toby Nebrida said.

Eastern Petroleum chairman and chief executive Fernando Martinez said that if the country?s largest oil firms were registering big profit drop and net losses, the smaller ones were prone to suffering more.

Elsewhere, China Petroleum and Chemical Corp. reported a 39-percent net income drop in the third quarter, attributed mainly to high crude costs during that period. With editing by INQUIRER.net