PetroChina Profit Slumps 58% on Lower Oil Prices

(Bloomberg) -- PetroChina Co., the country’s biggest oil and gas producer, said third-quarter profit fell amid lower crude prices and weaker refining and chemical operations.

• Net income dropped to 8.83 billion yuan ($1.3 billion) in the three months ended September, from 21.04 billion a year ago, the company said in a filing to the Shanghai stock exchange Wednesday.

Key Insights

• PetroChina’s income from exploration & production was exposed to the 18% drop on-year in average Brent prices during the quarter.
  • E&P operating profit in the third quarter slumped 17% from a year ago, according to Bloomberg calculations.
• The state-owned producer also faced pressure from its downstream businesses and cited competition in the domestic fuel market. Operating profit from its refining and chemicals segment shrank 82% in the third quarter,
• PetroChina continued to lose money from selling imported natural gas domestically at regulated prices. Those losses widened to 10.6 billion yuan during the quarter from 6.54 billion yuan a year ago.
• The company’s upstream business is likely to benefit in the fourth quarter from crude price’s stabilization and peak demand for natural gas, said Tian Miao, an analyst at Everbright Sun Hung Kai Co.

Get More

• Crude oil output rose 2.9% to 682.7 million barrels in the first nine months of the year.
  • Domestic production climbed 1.4% to 556.9 million barrels.
• Natural gas production increased 8.7% to 2.89 trillion cubic feet in the same period.
  • Domestic output gained 9.7% to 2.69 trillion cubic feet.
• Average realized crude oil price fell 9.5% to $61.49 a barrel in the nine-month period.
  • Natural gas dropped 4% to $5.49 per thousand cubic feet

To contact Bloomberg News staff for this story: Jasmine Ng in Singapore at jng299@bloomberg.net;Feifei Shen in Beijing at fshen11@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Ramsey Al-Rikabi at ralrikabi@bloomberg.net

©2019 Bloomberg L.P.

With assistance from Bloomberg