Wedoany.com Report-Mar 27, China’s largest offshore oil and gas driller said net income rose to 137.9 billion yuan ($19 billion) in 2024, from 123.9 billion yuan the previous year, according to a filing on Thursday. That missed expectations of 144.6 billion yuan and was shy of the record profit of 141.7 billion yuan set in 2022.
Output rose to 726.8 million barrels of oil equivalent, from 678 million barrels a year earlier. The state-owned company has led Beijing’s efforts to enhance energy security and its operations have now delivered a sixth consecutive year of record production.
Cnooc’s focus on extraction leaves its earnings heavily dependent on global oil prices, which on average were about 3% less in 2024 than the previous year. But it also means the company is relatively unaffected by the headwinds to demand faced by its downstream peers. Earlier this week, China’s biggest refiner, Sinopec, reported a tumble in profits as the electric-vehicle boom weighs on consumption of diesel and gasoline.
PetroChina Co. — the country’s largest oil and gas company, whose operations straddle drilling, refining and retail — reports earnings on Sunday.
China’s energy giants are increasingly looking to natural gas to drive growth, although domestic prices have stumbled recently due a slowing economy and plethora of supply options, from domestic fields and gas piped overland from Russia and central Asia, to pricier seaborne imports of liquefied natural gas.
Another focus is investing in petrochemicals to offset weakness in transport fuels. In that vein, Cnooc is bolstering downstream operations, with a $2.7 billion expansion of its Daxie refinery that’s expected to start up in June.
