The giant Saudi Aramco oil company announced, on Sunday, that it achieved an 82 percent increase in its profits in the first quarter of 2022, compared to the same period last year, thanks to the high oil prices that made it the most expensive company in the world in market value.
The announcement is a continuation of the good news for the Saudi economy, which is achieving the fastest growth rate in a decade thanks to the revenues of the oil sector.
The company said, in a statement, that it achieved “a quarterly net income with an increase of 82 percent, from 81.4 billion riyals ($21.7 billion) in the first quarter of 2021 to 148.0 billion riyals ($39.5 billion). ) in the first quarter of this year.
She pointed out that “the rise was primarily driven by the increase in crude oil prices and sales volumes, and the improvement in the profit margins of the refining, processing and marketing business.
The announcement of Aramco’s quarterly profits comes four days following the Saudi oil company ousted the American technology giant Apple as the most valuable company in the world in market value, with its shares reaching $2.42 trillion, compared to Apple’s $2.37 trillion.
In March, Aramco announced that it had recorded a 124% increase in its annual net profit in 2021 compared to 2020, when the Corona pandemic hit the economies of the year. But Aramco, the jewel in the crown of the kingdom’s economy, faces security challenges caused by the continuing confrontation between the Saudi-led military coalition and the Houthis, who have constantly targeted the company’s oil facilities across the country. In March, the company’s facilities were subjected to multiple attacks by drones that attacked a petroleum products distribution station in the south of the kingdom, a natural gas plant and an oil refinery in the west of the kingdom. An attack on the facilities of the Yanbu Sinopec Refining Company (YASREF) caused a “temporary drop in the refinery’s production level,” Aramco said at the time. In September 2019, attacks on the oil facilities of Aramco, the world’s largest crude oil exporter, temporarily halved the kingdom’s production. And in early May, Saudi Arabia announced that it had achieved its fastest economic growth rate in a decade thanks to the revenues of the oil sector, recording an increase of 9.6 percent in the first quarter compared to the same period in 2021. Saudi Arabia, one of the largest oil producers and exporters in the world, rejected American pressures. To increase production in order to reduce prices that have risen dramatically since the beginning of the war in Ukraine.
