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MOSCOW (MRC) -- Russia's largest
petrochemicals producer, Sibur, said its core earnings rose 5% in 2021 as it
expanded production with the launch of a new plant, but was also hit by lower
prices of liquefied petroleum gas and naphtha, said Hydrocarbonprocessing.
Sibur
has been looking to do an IPO for years, and said last year that it would be
better placed for an initial public offering once the new plant, ZapSibNeftekhim
in Western Siberia, was completed. However, it has yet to confirm IPO plans or
give a timeframe.
The company said on Thursday that another plant under
construction in Eastern Siberia, the Amur Gas Chemical Complex, could start
operations six months ahead of schedule by mid-2024 and the cost of the project
will probably be USD10 billion, down from previous estimates of between USD10
billion and USD11 billion.
The Amur Gas complex is expected to produce
2.3 million tons of polyethylene and 400,000 tons of polypropylene a year.
China's Sinopec has acquired a 40% stake in the project and Sibur's Chief
Financial Officer Peter O'Brien said the Chinese company paid around 18.27
billion roubles (USD248 million) for the stake.
Sibur said core earnings
last year rose by 5.4% to 179 billion roubles (USD2.4 billion), with
petrochemical product sale volumes rising 37% to 5.15 million tons. Revenue,
however, slipped 1.6% to 523 billion roubles partly due to lower prices for
liquefied petroleum gas and naphtha in the first half of the year. Adjusted net
income fell 0.4% to 93 billion roubles.
As MRC reported before,
earlier this weak, Sibur Holding and China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation
(Sinopec), China’s leading energy and chemical company, closed the deal to set
up a joint venture (JV) at the Amur Gas Chemical Complex after obtaining all the
necessary approvals from the regulators of both countries. SIBUR and Sinopec
will hold interest in the JV in the amount of 60% and 40%, respectively.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE)
and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's ScanPlast report,
Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 2,220,640 tonnes in 2020, up by 2%
year on year. Only shipments of low density polyethylene (LDPE) and high density
polyethylene (HDPE) increased. At the same time, polypropylene (PP) shipments to
the Russian market reached 1 240,000 tonnes in 2020 (calculated using the
formula: production, minus exports, plus imports, excluding producers'
inventories as of 1 January, 2020). Supply of exclusively PP random copolymer
increased.
Sibur is a uniquely positioned vertically integrated gas
processing and petrochemicals company. We own and operate Russia’s largest gas
processing business in terms of associated petroleum gas processing volumes and
are a leader in the Russian petrochemicals industry. As of 31 March 2014, SIBUR
operated 27 production sites located all over Russia, had over 1,400 large
customers engaged in the energy, chemical, fast moving consumer goods (FMCG),
automotive, construction and other industries in approximately 70 countries
worldwide and employed over 27,000 personnel. |
