PetroChina posts record interim profit, but fuel sales decline
SINGAPORE, Aug 26 (Reuters) - China's largest oil and gas company PetroChina's first-half net income hit a new high, up 3.9% compared with a year ago, the company said on Monday, as higher oil and gas prices outweighed the impact of reduced refining profits.
Net income was 88.61 billion yuan ($12.44 billion) and total revenue was up 5% at 1.554 trillion yuan during the period, according to a filing with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
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China's leading refiner Sinopec 0386.HK earlier posted a 2.6% rise in net interim profit of $5.2 billion, bolstered by record oil and gas output although sluggish fuel and petrochemicals demand dragged.
Chinese demand for transportation fuel diesel has slumped because of a prolonged property crisis and the substitution of cheaper natural gas as truck fuel, while growth in gasoline use has been capped by the rise of new-energy vehicles.
PetroChina, China's second-largest refiner, posted a 3% growth in crude throughput for the first half at 693.3 million barrels, or 3.81 million bpd. The growth eased from first quarter's 8.2%, suggesting a weaker second quarter.
Its total sales volume of gasoline, kerosene and diesel for the period dropped 2% at 79.05 million tons, with diesel leading the fall, down 5.6%, and gasoline fell 2.7%.
Sales of aviation fuel expanded 16.4%, however, following recovery in outbound travel and the group's natural gas sales grew 12.9% on the year to 147.2 billion cubic meters.
Domestic natural gas output rose 2.9% at 2,486.8 billion cubic feet, while overseas production gained 2.5% at 97.4 billion cubic feet.
PetroChina's total crude oil output rose 0.1% on the year to 474.8 million barrels, or 2.61 million barrels per day (bpd).
Its domestic output grew 0.1% to 392.8 million barrels and production outside China was unchanged at 82 million barrels.
The results were published after the market close.
PetroChina's Hong Kong listed shares closed up 1.6% on Monday and have grown 33% so far this year, outperforming the Hang Seng index which has risen 4.4%.
(metric ton = 7.3 barrels for crude oil conversion)
($1 = 7.1209 Chinese yuan renminbi)
(Reporting by Chen Aizhu; editing by Barbara Lewis)