Santos' 2019 Production Hits Record

Australian explorer Santos January 22 said its 2019 production was at a record 75.5mn barrels of oil equivalent, up 28% on the previous year. This was at the top end of its guidance range of 74-76mn boe.

Company’s sales revenue was also at a record US$4bn, up 10% on year owing to a 21% year on year jump in sales volume which stod at 94.5mn boe.

In the three months to December 31 (Q4 2019) Santos posted a near 18% rise in production. The company produced 18.7mn boe in Q4 2019 as against 15.9mn boe in Q4 2018. Revenue in the quarter fell to US$1.03bn from US$1.04bn a year earlier, hurt by customer outages in Western Australia.

Santos CEO Kevin Gallagher sounded confident about the future. “The acquisition of ConocoPhillips’ natural gas assets in northern Australia and Timor-Leste announced in October is fully aligned with our growth strategy to build on existing infrastructure positions and delivers operatorship and control of strategic LNG infrastructure at Darwin.”

Gallagher added that natural gas is forecast to supply a quarter of the world’s total energy demand by 2040 and Santos is well-positioned to benefit as it seeks to deliver 120mn boe of production by 2025.