China's Sinopec flips to quarterly profit on robust refining business

Beijing/Singapore

TOP Asian oil refiner Sinopec Corp swung to a record quarterly profit in July-September, a company filing showed on Wednesday, thanks to a robust refining business and earnings from the spin-off of pipeline assets.

The firm posted net income of 46.39 billion yuan (S$9.4 billion) during the three months, nearly quadruple the level a year earlier, Sinopec said in a filing to the Shanghai Stock Exchange, after losses in the first two quarters of the year. That's the highest quarterly profit according to Refinitiv Eikon data going back to 2003.

With the launch of a 200,000 barrel-per-day refinery in the southern Chinese city Zhanjiang and the buying frenzy of cheap oil, Sinopec's refinery crude throughput rose nearly 2 per cent year on year to 63.5 million tonnes in July-September. Domestic fuel sales were 45.44 million tonnes over the period, up 0.4 per cent from the previous quarter. REUTERS