(RTTNews) - Tesoro Corp. (TSO: News ), a refiner and marketer of petroleum products, is slated to announce its third-quarter results before the market opens Monday. Wall Street analysts are of the view that the company would face a sharp year-over-year decline in its quarterly earnings and revenues.

Companies operating in the oil sector have had a tough time as the economic crisis was curtailing oil demand. Adding to this, oil prices have more or less halved from an all time high of $147 per barrel reported in July 2008.

San Antonio, Texas-based Tesoro operates in two segments, Refining and Retail. The company operates seven refineries in the Western US with a combined rated crude oil capacity of approximately 664,000 barrels per day. The Refining segment processes both heavy and light crude oils and produces primarily gasoline and gasoline blendstocks, jet fuel, diesel fuel, and heavy fuel oils. It also manufactures other refined products, including liquefied petroleum gas, petroleum coke, and asphalt.

The company's retail-marketing system includes over 870 branded retail gas stations, of which more than 380 are company-operated under the Tesoro, Shell, Mirastar and USA Gasoline brands.

On average, analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expect a profit of $0.01 per share for the quarter on revenues of $4.71 billion. Analysts' estimates typically exclude one-time items.

For the year-ago third quarter, the company had posted earnings of $1.63 per share on revenues of $8.70 billion.
In July, Tesoro reported a second-quarter net loss of $45 million or $0.33 per share, compared to earnings of $4 million or $0.03 per share last year. Net revenue was $4.18 billion, down from $8.88 billion in the year-ago quarter.

A fire broke out in the coking unit at Tesoro's Wilmington refinery in September. The company said last month that it expects to resume operation of the unit at full rates, which would allow the refinery to return to its planned production levels at that time.

Among Tesoro's rivals, oil giant Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM: News ) on October 29 reported a plunge in its third-quarter profit, impacted by lower commodity prices and weak product margins. The Irving, Texas-based company's net income attributable to the company was $4.73 billion or $0.98 per share, compared with $14.83 billion or $2.85 per share last year. Total revenues and other income were down 40% to $82.26 billion from $137.74 billion in the prior-year quarter.

Another peer, Valero Energy Corp. (VLO: News ) last week said that its loss widened in the third quarter as it recorded a significant loss contingency accrual. The contingency accrual is related to a dispute on certain issues between Valero and the Government of Aruba. The San-Antonio, Texas-based company's loss for the quarter was $629 million or $1.12 per share, compared with a profit of $1.15 billion or $2.18 per share a year ago. Operating revenues declined to $19.5 billion from $35.9 billion in the same quarter last year.

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