Saudi Aramco pays out $29.4bn dividend despite drop in profits

August 07, 2023 (MLN): Saudi Aramco, the world’s biggest oil exporter, is raising its payout to shareholders by more than half as it announced a performance-linked dividend despite a drop in quarterly profit, Bloomberg reported.

The total payout will be $29.4 billion, including the performance-linked portion, up from a regular dividend of $18.8bn a year ago, according to a statement from the company.

Operating income dropped to 213bn riyals ($57 million) from 324bn riyals a year earlier, the company said in a statement.

Aramco followed other international oil producers in boosting payouts to shareholders even as profits declined.

Oil majors have seen profits drop as crude prices retreated from last year’s highs when commodity markets were roiled by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

As leader of the OPEC+ producers group along with Russia, the Saudis have pushed the cartel to extend output cuts for the rest of the year.

Aramco has been pumping the least crude since the depths of the Coronavirus pandemic after the kingdom began implementing an additional, unilateral reduction of 1m barrels a day last month.

Oil rose after the Saudis announced last week that they’ll extend that cut into September and could even deepen it if needed.

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