LITTLE ROCK — Chevron Corp., the second-largest U.S. energy company by market value, topped the highest second-quarter profit estimate from analysts after an 80 percent jump in refining returns helped make up for falling oil prices.

Quarterly net income fell to $7.21 billion, or $3.66 a share, from $7.73 billion, or $3.85, a year earlier, the San Ramon, Calif.-based company said in a statement Friday. The result was 35 cents more than the average of four analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg, which ranged from $3.10 to $3.47.

Chevron’s oil refineries and filling stations earned $1.88 billion as U.S. refining margins climbed to a second-quarter record average of $28.98 a barrel when crude costs fell faster than gasoline prices. Brent crude, the benchmark for two-thirds of the world’s oil, fell 7 percent from a year earlier to average $108.76 a barrel over concern that slowing growth in China and Europe’s sovereign debt crises will stifle energy demand.

“Strong refining margins helped them a lot,” said Allen Good, an analyst at Morningstar Investment Service in Chicago. “In contrast to some of their competitors, Chevron’s heavier exposure to oil and minimal exposure to low natural-gas prices helped keep the upstream afloat.”

Sales fell 9.2 percent to $62.6 billion.

Chevron shares rose 99 cents to close at $109.26.

Chevron’s refining profit included about $200 million in proceeds from the sale of a power business in South Korea and other assets, according to the statement. Income from oil and gas wells fell 18 percent to $5.62 billion.

“I view them as the core energy holding investors should have,” Brian Young- berg, an analyst at Edward Jones in St. Louis, said after the results were announced. “They’re more profitable per barrel, they have way more cash than debt and they pay a good dividend.”

Production declined 2.6 percent to the equivalent of 2.62 million barrels a day. The company won’t meet its fullyear goal of producing the daily average equivalent of 2.68 million barrels of crude, Vice Chairman and Executive Vice President George Kirkland said during a conference call with analysts.

Contributing factors to the shortfall include the temporary shutdown of the Frade field in Brazil after seeping oil on the seafloor angered government regulators, as well as maintenance work at the company’s Tengiz project in Kazakhstan, he said.

Chairman and Chief Executive Officer John Watson expanded the capital-projects budget 12 percent this year to $32.7 billion as part of a longterm plan to increase daily production by one-fifth to the equivalent of 3.3 million barrels by the end of 2017.

The company’s exploration plans include a pair of wells scheduled for next year in Iraq’s Kurdistan region.

U.S. energy explorers were hurt by a 46 percent slide in natural-gas prices during the second quarter compared with a year earlier, to an average of $2.354 per 1 million British thermal units, the lowest since 1999.

Chevron is the least-exposed of the major U.S. energy producers to tumbling natural-gas prices because its output is more heavily weighted to crude than its largest domestic rivals.

Business, Pages 27 on 07/28/2012