The high energy prices ensure that the oil and gas companies are bubbling with profits.
The British Shell group reported the second record profit in a row for the spring quarter on Thursday.
With a $11.5 billion surplus in the months of April to June, profits were again higher than the $9.1 billion in the previous quarter.
Helmut Buender
Business correspondent in Düsseldorf.
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Andreas Mihm
Business correspondent for Austria, Central and Eastern Europe and Turkey based in Vienna.
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Philip Pickert
Business correspondent based in London.
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Niklas Zaboji
Economic correspondent in Paris
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Shell, Europe's largest oil company, spoke of "extraordinarily strong" earnings.
The group has produced a little less oil than before.
However, the sharp rise in prices since the Ukraine war has boosted sales and profits.
Shell's stock market value has risen by more than 25 percent since the beginning of the year.
It is currently around $190 billion.
French competitor Totalenergies (formerly Total), with a market value of $130 billion, is now the third most valuable French company behind luxury and consumer goods giants LVMH and L'Oréal.
In the spring quarter, he generated a net profit of 5.7 billion euros – minus a billion-dollar reserve for his stake in the Russian Novatek group, which had been formed due to the threat of sanctions.
Excluding this special item, the French quarterly profit is $9.8 billion.
In addition to the high price of oil, Totalenergies benefits from the fact that they have been active in the liquid gas business for years and this is more in demand than ever.
The group now wants its investors to share in its success with a special dividend of 69 cents per share.
He also announced a new share buyback program of up to 2 billion euros - analogous to the Shell group, but which even wants to buy back securities worth 6 billion dollars and thus boost the share price.
The stock market has already gone uphill sharply in the past few months.
Also for the Austrian energy and chemicals group OMV, which was able to more than double its sales and profits in the first half of the year.
Like Totalenergies, the partially state-owned company believes it is possible to pay a special dividend for the current financial year.
Chief Financial Officer Reinhard Florey said that the topic is "not currently actively discussed", but he is not ruling it out either.
We will await further developments in the second half of the year.
Florey pointed out that significantly more money would have to be spent to secure the gas supply, which has so far been largely based on Russian sources.
The power plants are running at full speed
On the other hand, the OMV CFO sees himself "very well positioned" with a cash position of 6.5 billion euros.
In the first half of the year, group sales increased by 124 percent to 30.6 billion euros.
After deducting the special effects due to the write-downs on the Russian business and the share in the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline in the amount of 2 billion euros, the group reports a profit for the period of 3.4 billion euros.
In Germany, on the other hand, the energy giant RWE stands out with brilliant deals.
The net result of the Essen-based group almost doubled in the first half of the year, which is why the outlook for 2022 was raised unusually sharply.
CFO Michael Müller has already announced that the forecast will be raised for the coming year.
One driver is global energy trading.
At the same time, the RWE power plants in Germany and the foreign markets are running at full speed thanks to the high demand for electricity.
The gas-fired power plants, in particular, made extraordinarily good profits, while RWE also benefited from better wind conditions than in the previous year at its onshore and offshore wind farms.
Electricity generation in the lignite-fired power plants and in the remaining nuclear power plant in Emsland is also at a high level.
However, the current price development is not reflected in their results, because the production of these plants was partly sold years ago at fixed conditions.
But while shareholders rejoice in higher profits, the populace groans at the burden of soaring energy bills.
The average regulated household bill in the UK, for example, jumped from around £1,300 to nearly £2,000 for gas and electricity in April.
According to the latest forecasts, households could end up paying well over £3,000 next winter.
Both Tory candidates to succeed Prime Minister Boris Johnson have now announced tax cuts in a bid to lower consumer bills.
The British government also wants to skim off excess profits from energy companies.
As early as June, she decided on a "windfall tax" that oil and gas suppliers have to pay.
This should bring 5 billion pounds to the Treasury.
The Finance Minister at the time, Rishi Sunak, briefly considered introducing a special tax for electricity providers as well.
However, after concerns that this could slow down investments in the expansion of renewable energies, he refrained from doing so.
In France, the government urged the energy giant Totalenergies, which is also under fire because of its high profits, to offer a price reduction at the petrol pumps, in addition to the state fuel rebate of soon 30 cents per liter of fuel.
From September onwards, the group will deduct a further 20 cents from all French petrol stations.
According to estimates by the newspaper "Les Echos", Totalenergies will cost 500 million euros for the measure.
French government spokesman Olivier Véran called the price reduction granted as a result of political pressure "more effective" than a special tax.