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BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s Sinopec Corp said on Sunday it posted a 2.6 percent rise in net profit in the first half of the year as higher oil prices boosted income.
China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. (OTC:) and Chemical Corp., formally known as Sinopec, reported net income of 37.1 billion yuan ($5.21 billion) in the January-June period on Sunday, according to a filing with the Shanghai Stock Exchange.
Sales at Sinopec, the world’s largest oil refiner by capacity, fell 1.1% to 1.58 trillion yuan.
Meanwhile, production of ethylene, a building block of petrochemicals, fell 5.5% in the first half.
Capital expenditure amounted to 55.9 billion yuan during the period.
Crude oil output rose 0.6% year-on-year to 140.53 million barrels, Sinopec said earlier, while production rose 6% to 700.57 billion cubic feet.
The company said in a stock exchange filing in July that it processed 126.69 million metric tons of crude oil, or about 5.08 million barrels per day, up 0.1 percent from the same period last year.
This compared with growth of 1.7% in the first quarter. The slowdown was driven by higher crude oil prices and weak domestic demand for fuel.
(1 dollar = 7.1244 renminbi)
(This story has been corrected to say that Sinopec’s first-half profit rose 2.6%, not 2.7%, and the reference to figures based on Chinese standards has been removed.)
