Royal Dutch Shell posted an unprecedented loss of $21.7bn in 2020, compared with net profit of almost $16bn in 2019, the oil giant confirmed on Thursday.

Shell, like all oil and gas companies, has been hit by a combination of the oil crisis and the coronavirus pandemic, which has hammered the sale of petrol, diesel and airline fuel.

Chief executive Ben Burden described 2020 as ‘extraordinary’ and said in a statement that the company had ‘taken tough but decisive actions and demonstrated highly resilient operational delivery.’

Earlier this week, ExxonMobil announced it had made a loss of $22.4bn while BP lost $5.7bn.

Last month it emerged that Shell is cutting some 900 jobs in the Netherlands as part of its earlier announced global reorganisation and was appealing for people to take voluntary redundancy.

Shell said in September it planned to cut between 7,000 and 9,000 jobs by 2022 as part of an ongoing restructuring process to create a simpler, streamlined and lower-cost organisation. By making the organisation simpler, Shell said it hopes to deliver annual cost savings of between $2bn and $2.5bn a year.