PETRONAS DAGANGAN Q3 NET PROFIT FALLS TO RM119.31 MLN

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 26 -- Petronas Dagangan Bhd’s (PDB) net profit for the third quarter ended Sept 30, 2021 (Q3 FY2021) fell to RM119.31 million from RM212.66 million compared to the same quarter last year.

However, revenue rose to RM5.2 billion from RM4.83 billion previously.

PDB told the stock exchange the group’s sales continued to experience the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic although there were fewer restrictions during the period.

However, the group said the improvement in the trend of MOPS prices and the gradual recovery due to the easing of restrictions has supported the improvement in the group’s bottom line performance year to date.

MOPS (short for the Mean of Platts Singapore) is the average of a set of Singapore-based oil product price assessments published by Platts, a global energy, petrochemicals, metals and agriculture information provider and a division of S&P Global, according to Wikipedia.

The group’s revenue for the quarter increased by RM370.2 million as average selling prices increased by 23 per cent despite lower sales volume by 12 per cent while its pretax profit of RM165.5 million was lower by RM122.8 million compared to the corresponding quarter last year.

“This was due to lower gross profit following lower sales volume as well as lower other income during the current quarter. The decrease was offset by lower operating expenditure, mainly from lower dealer’s commission in line with lower sales volume,” it noted.

Moving forward, the group has anticipated that the various initiatives announced in the recent budget will have a positive impact on PDB's product demand.

On another note, it said Brent Crude prices also continued to increase compared to the previous quarter stimulated by economic recovery in major markets around the world and the OPEC+ decision to maintain its monthly production increase until early 2022.

“We are monitoring the market trend closely for growth opportunities. Although we are optimistic of maintaining the growth recovery with more economic sectors reopening and the easing of movement restrictions, we remain cautious on the rate of recovery given the rising cases globally,” it added.

-- BERNAMA