Petro Rabigh shares drop 6% in wake of €1.5bn loss

Riyadh - Rabigh Refining and Petrochemical Co. (Petro Rabigh) has announced that it expects to report losses of over SAR6.4 billion (€1.5 billion), due “challenging market conditions", production outages and other factors.

In a 16 Jan stock exchange filing, the Saudi Aramco-Sumitomo Chemical JV said its accumulated losses had reached 38.34% of its share capital of SAW16,710 million.

The figure, it said, was based on the unaudited financial results for December 2023.

The company said it incurred these losses primarily due the challenging market conditions, which it said “adversely affected the margins for both refined and petrochemical products”.

Furthermore, Petro-Rabigh said the “significant increase” in the financing costs, due to rising interest rates was another contributor to the losses.

Other issues included planned and unplanned turnaround procedures at the site as well as a one-off provision of SAR365.7 million, relating to a claim raised by a third-party against the company.

Petro Rabigh shares fell by over 6% following the announcement, closing at SAR9.45 at the end of business on 18 Jan.

The company has the capacity to produce 75 kilotonnes per annum (ktpa) of EPDM, in addition to other products such as thermoplastic olefins (TPOs) and other polymers. 

Last January, Petro Rabigh and Saudi Top Plastic signed an MoU to build a SAR100-million polymer compounding site in Saudi Arabia with the capacity to process 5ktpa of polymer compounds, rubber and industrial waxes. (ERJ report)