Rosneft NEWS

Rosneft Oil Co. said Friday that it swung into a net loss for the first quarter of 2020, and that it was launching a buyback program. The London-listed Russian oil company said net loss for the period was 156 billion rubles ($2.12 billion) compared with a net profit of RUB131 billion for the first quarter of 2019. The company said this was due mainly to a foreign-exchange loss of RUB177 billion due to the depreciation of the ruble and revaluation of foreign-currency financial liabilities.

Washington on Tuesday imposed sanctions on the trading arm of Russia's Rosneft. This has created a difficult situation for Reliance Industries, a key buyer of Venezuelan oil. The Indian refiner said, "Reliance will continue its direct communications with the US Government to ensure that Reliance's purchases of Venezuelan oil after the RTSA sanctions are both compliant with US sanctions and consistent with US policies regarding Venezuelan oil sector".

With a significant drop in the new coronavirus cases in the epicentre of the outbreak, oil prices increased by 1% on Thursday. Brent went up by 0.8% and was traded at $59.57 a barrel. WTI rose by 0.9% and was traded at $53.78 per barrel. On the other hand, blockade of ports and oilfields in Libya and US sanctions on Rosneft has reignited the global oil supply worries.

US has been constantly pressurizing the Venezuelan government of Nicolas Maduro over ties with other energy companies and vice-versa. From Russia's Rosneft to Chevron and Reliance, everyone has been warned to "tread cautiously". These comments have come in response to the question on about possible sanctions against Rosneft. I would tread cautiously towards their activities in Venezuela that are in support, directly or indirectly, of the Maduro dictatorship because ... we're halfway through our maximum pressure campaign", said US official.

According to the sources, Rosneft has shown interest to bid for the acquisition of Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL). Under India's biggest privatisation plan, the country is selling all of its 53% stakes in the firm. In a meeting between Rosneft's CEO Sechin and Pradhan, the former was keen to expand in the world's third largest energy market.

Sources have revealed that Rosneft-owned Nayara Energy is planning on investing $19 billion in at Vadinar near Jamnagar. Staying in line with its expansion plans, the energy firm plans on setting up a 10.75 MMTPA capacity petrochemical complex and expand the refinery from 20MMTPA to 46MMTPA. The expansion will also be a debut venture into petrochemical business for the firm.

Nayara Energy has raised $750 million through an offshore loan. It has planned to reduce the company's cost of debt and strengthen its balance sheet with this money. According to a source, "The deal structure allows Nayara to leverage its regular export flows to optimise its capital structure and liability profile”. The loan is termed as Prepayment Finance Facility. Under this deal, Nayara will deliver gasoil to BP and Trafigura.

The pipeline monopoly of Russia, Transneft slammed Rosneft on Monday. The company rebuked due to the disinterest shown by the oil producer to help resolve a contaminated oil crisis in the Russian Druzhba. On this, Rosneft said, "Instead of not so constructive comments, we'd like to see a clear and public plan of measures". This problem has tainted Russia's credibility as an energy supplier.

Oil prices extended further decline on Wednesday due to unexpected gain in US inventories. The prices were also dragged down because of the questions thrown at OPEC on supply cut by Russian state oil producer Rosneft. Brent went down by 0.7% and was traded at $61.55 a barrel. WTI decreased by 0.9% and was traded at $53 a barrel.

Rosneft has decided to load an extra oil cargo from the Pacific port of Kozmino on May 30-31. This is apart from what was decided in the initial loading plan. This decision has come amidst the existing Russian oil export problems in Europe. The extra loading will increase the overall exports from Kozmino in May. It will reach an all-time high of 2.94 million tonnes.

In a statement yesterday, CEO at Nayara Energy said that the firm has concluded a $750 million pre-payment deal with BP and Trafigura. The deal will require Nayara Energy to repay the two firms with the supply of gasoline and gasoil over the course of the next four years. Nayara, formerly known as Essar Oil, was acquired in 2017 by Rosneft-led consortium where Russian fund UCP and Geneva-based Trafigura are partners.

State-run SOCAR has revealed plans of expanding its portfolio of processed grades of oil at its $6.3 billion-STAR refinery in Turkey. General Manager at the Azerbaijani energy firm said that the STAR refinery is already running at full capacity and intends to process approx. 900,000 tonnes of crude from May. The refinery, which started operations in October 2018, has processed only Rosneft’s Urals crude oil.

A fire broke out yesterday at the Russian oil major, Rosneft’s Kuibyshev Refinery, which was later put out. A source told news agency TASS, “Provisionally, the fire happened on the territory of the Kuibyshev Refinery, by now it has been put out,”. Output at the Kuibyshev refinery, which processes 7.9 million tonnes of oil per year, hasn’t been affected.

Mozambique’s government informed that it has signed an oil exploration agreement with ExxonMobil and Rosneft. The energy regulator of Mozambique, National Petroleum Institute said that the government is planning to get into similar agreements with Sasol of South Africa and Itlay’s Eni. These energy firms will drill a minimum of 10 wells which is expected to lead to an investment of as much as $700 million.

The consortium operating the 250,000 bpd Sakhalin-1 project in Russia has agreed to pay Russian oil major, Rosneft $230 million to settle the production dispute out-of-court. Rosneft, in June, had dragged the consortium of ExxonMobil, ONGC Videsh Ltd, and SODECO to court. Rosneft was seeking $1.4 billion in damages, alleging "unjust enrichment and interest gained by using other people's money". OVL will pay $46 million as part of settlement money.

Russian oil major, Rosneft reported a nearly three-fold increase in profit to around $3.6 billion in the second quarter earnings. The growth in net profit is attributed to the higher oil prices along with a weaker Russian ruble, which reduced the expenses of oil producers. Rosneft is now eyeing to reduce its net debt, which was already down by about 12% in 2Q2018.

Keeping in mind the condition of its shares in the market, Russia based Rosneft approved a share buyback scheme of £1.5billion. It will help the company to become more attractive to investors. The buyback for upto 340 million shares will run till December 31, 2020. An independent agent will be appointed by the firm to execute the buyback. Rosneft hiked its Q2 daily production quota to 4.6 million bpd.

Russian oil major, Rosneft has slammed a $1.4bn lawsuit against a consortium led by oil supermajor, ExxonMobil. Rosneft has filed the suit in a local arbitration court, alleging the consortium, which is working on the Sakhalin-1 project, of “unjust enrichment” in 2015, demanding payment of $1.41bn. Analysts see the lawsuit further deteriorating foreign investor appetite in Russia’s energy industry, which is already in a miserable state due to western sanctions.