9% is exceptionally high for some industries (eg, commodities or retail). For example, Wal-Mart is closer to 3%. Its not unusual to see targets of close to 4%.

I do agree with you that it isn't unexpected during a period of sanctions on a country that produces ~10% of the worldwide oil supply, though. Profits naturally will rise for the remaining players.

Now do Apple/Google/Facebook.

Those aren't in commodities markets.

Oil is the textbook commodity and the expected profit margin on commodities is ~zero. That's the nature of a commodity: a good so interchangeable, with so many competing producers, that the profit margins are inevitably minimized.

By ~zero do you mean "covering just the cost of capital over a full cycle"? This is a textbook example of a capital intensive and cyclical industry.

The problem is that supply naturally reacts slowly and ~1/10th of the supply was removed from the global market. I've heard people act as if that's a small shift, but its really not small at all over the short term.

Not all commodities are equally recoverable at similar costs though, and in a world where we need more oil/copper/iron than can come out of the cheapest mine, there will be profit