Sinopec H1 Profit Rises 24%

(RTTNews) - China Petroleum & Chemical Corp., (SNP), China's largest oil refiner, Sunday said its first-half profit rose 24 percent, as its refining business returned to black and loss at its chemical division narrowed.

The Beijing-based refiner, popularly known as Sinopec, reported first-half net profit attributable to equity shareholders of the company of 29.42 billion Chinese yuan, a 24 percent increase compared to 23.70 billion yuan last year.

Net profit attributable to owners of the company rose to 30.28 billion yuan from 24.50 billion yuan a year ago. Earnings, on a per share basis, rose to 0.25 yuan from 0.21 yuan last year.

The company's turnover, other operating revenues and other income grew 5 percent to 1.415 trillion from a year ago.

Sinopec's refining division swung back to a profit in the first half of 2013, with a operating profit of 213 million yuan from an operating loss of 18.50 billion yuan last year. The company said its first-half refinery throughput rose 5.17 percent to 115 million tons. Oil and gas production rose 3.8 percent to 219.5 million barrels of oil equivalent.

The strong results of Sinopec's refinery business reflects the reformation in fuel pricing in China. In March, the Chinese government allowed a more flexible pricing mechanism for refined oil products by passing higher crude oil costs to the consumers. Earlier, state-owned oil companies in China used to suffer huge losses mainly because of inability to pass the sharp rises in international crude oil prices to its customers.

Sinopec Chairman Fu Chengyu said,. "We saw a challenging and complex global economy and energy market in the first half of 2013. In response to market changes, Sinopec worked hard to expand sales, adjust raw material and feed stock mix, as well as product mix to achieve the resulting good performance."

Chemical business' operating for the six-month period narrowed to 409 million yuan from 1.25 billion yuan last year, reflecting lower expenses.

Meanwhile, the strong results from the refinery business was partially offset by exploration and production segment, where operating profit dropped to 30.91 billion yuan from 40.46 billion yuan last year, due mainly to the fall in oil prices. Operating profit of marketing and distribution division also dropped to 16.85 billion yuan from 20.25 billion yuan last year.

The company boosted its dividend by 21 percent to 0.09 yuan per share from a year ago.

SNP closed Friday's trading at $75.07, up $0.49 or 0.66%, on the NYSE.