CNOOC to pay $6b dividend
REUTERS
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Updated at 2.05pm:
China's largest offshore oil producer CNOOC said in its latest listing document it declared a special dividend of 6.43 billion yuan (HK$5.96 billion) for 2000 ahead of its listing in New York and Hong Kong.
The dividend would be paid to its existing shareholders before January 31, 2001, CNOOC said in the fifth amendment of its listing prospectus filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission in the United States.
Analysts said a special dividend payment ahead of listing was not unusual for mainland oil and petrochemical companies.
''After the listing, the company is a brand new company so they want the previous cash reserves to be distributed to existing shareholders,'' an energy analyst said.
CNOOC, a listing vehicle of state-owned China National Offshore Oil Corporation, had cash and cash equivalents of 4.02 billion yuan at the end of last September.
The company posted net profit of 7.927 billion yuan for the nine months ended September 30, 2000, almost twice its full year profit of 4.11 billion in 1999. In the first nine months of 1999 the company posted a profit of 2.773 billion yuan.
CNOOC has yet to indicate its earnings forecast for full year 2000, but analysts in Hong Kong estimated the company will post net profit of more than 10 billion yuan.
The company plans to offer 1.64 billion shares in a global initial public offering with an over-allotment of up to 216.4 million shares which may be exercised depending on investor demand.
The shares are also available in the form of American Depositary Shares (ADSs) on the basis of 20 CNOOC shares per ADS.
The company has not yet released any listing schedule or price range for the issue.
But merchant banking sources said the IPO, estimated at US$1.1-1.4 billion, would be launched in late January or early February. The company shares would start trading in New York and Hong Kong in mid-February, they said.
CNOOC previously cancelled a planned US$1 billion IPO in October 1999 citing adverse market conditions.
The share holding of China National Offshore Oil Corporation in CNOOC, the latter incorporated in Hong Kong, would be diluted to 72.5 per cent from the current 91.5 per cent after the IPO, however that figure does not include the over-allotment option.
Last year eight blue-chip corporate investors purchased a total of 557.58 million shares or 8.5 per cent of the company's existing issued capital at US$0.825 per share.
CNOOC said its EBITDE (earnings before interest income, interest expenses, income tax and depreciation, dismantlement and site restoration allowance, exploration costs and exchange gains or losses) was 11.695 billion yuan for the nine months ended on September 30 2000, reflecting an EBITDE margin of 62.3 per cent.
This compared with an EBITDE of 8.63 billion yuan for full year 1999 and an EBITDE margin of 56.4 per cent.
Shell Overseas Investments, an unit of Royal Dutch/Shell, plans to buy a strategic stake of US$200-300 million worth of CNOOC IPO shares, according to the prospectus.
CNOOC employs just 1,000 staff, and analysts have previously described the company as one of the most efficient mainland state-owned enterprises because of its relatively small workforce, making its compensation and benefits burden far lighter than other state-owned firms.
CNOOC has interests in 45 oil and gas properties in four major producing areas: Bohai Bay, the western South China Sea, the eastern South China Sea and the East China Sea.
It is the dominant producer of offshore crude oil and natural gas of China and the only company permitted to conduct exploration and production activities with international oil and gas companies offshore China.
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