BP Cuts Spending as Fourth-Quarter Profit Falls on Lower Oil

BP Plc reported better-than-forecast fourth-quarter profit even as oil prices slumped, forcing Europe’s third-largest oil company to cut spending.

Profit adjusted for one-time items and inventory changes dropped to $2.2 billion from $2.8 billion a year earlier, the London-based company said in a statement. That beat the $1.6 billion average forecast of 13 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. The results were bolstered by income from BP’s 20 percent holding in Russia’s state-run oil producer OAO Rosneft.