DHAHRAN — Saudi Aramco’s President and Chief Executive Officer Amin H. Nasser said that the giant state oil company is looking to deliver sustainable dividend growth to shareholders.
He made this comment after Aramco launched its initial public offering (IPO) on Sunday by announcing its intention to float on the domestic bourse.
“Saudi Aramco’s vision is to be the world’s pre-eminent integrated energy and chemicals company,” Nasser said during the announcement.
“Over the last three years, we were responsible for one in every eight barrels of crude oil produced globally and our proved liquids reserves, at the end of 2018, were five times larger than the combined proved liquid reserves of the Five Major IOCs. We are a steadfast contributor to the world’s energy security,” he added.
He continued, “Our mission is to provide our shareholders with long-term value creation through crude oil price cycles by maintaining our pre-eminence in oil and gas production, capturing additional value across the hydrocarbon value chain and profitably growing our portfolio.
“Building on our position amongst the world’s least carbon intense sources of crude oil, Saudi Aramco aims to grow its business sustainability by leveraging technology and innovation to lower our climate impact. We deploy technology, with the aim of producing oil and gas ever more efficiently, reliably and sustainably.
“With a comprehensive and disciplined process for capital expenditures, we seek to maintain a prudent and flexible balance sheet.
“Our approach delivered higher operating cash flow, higher Free Cash Flow, higher EBIT, higher EBITDA and higher ROACE than each of the Five Major IOCs in 2018G.
“This supports our commitment to sustainable and growing dividends through crude oil price cycles by effectively utilizing our free cash flow while maintaining low targeted gearing ratios.
“We are proud of our many achievements over nearly nine decades and are excited about the prospects ahead.”
Meanwhile, an executive from NCB Capital said on Sunday that the government is working to accelerate the listing process for Aramco's initial public offering on the Saudi stock exchange to around two weeks.
The institutional investor tranche will take place over 14 days and the retail investors tranche over eight days, both launching at the same time, Sultan Mousa, vice president of investment banking at NCB Capital, said.
The old process would usually take around 4-6 weeks on the Saudi bourse, he told a news conference to launch the IPO with company executives at Aramco's headquarters. — Agencies
