Russian-Vietnamese oil giant makes $150 mln profit in first half

• Vietnam’s top lawmaker questions plan to pump more oil to boost GDP
• PetroVietnam’s contribution to state budget falls on low oil prices

Joint Russian-Vietnamese oil and gas enterprise Vietsovpetro made a profit of nearly $150 million during the first six months of 2016, despite price sliding global oil prices.

Data from Vietsovpetro showed that the company hit their  their goal to exploit 2.5 million tons of oil and 906 million cubic meters of gas for the first half of 2016, contributing $423 million to the state budget.

The company made of a profit of $148 million, of which the Russian partner took $72.5 million and the Vietnamese partner pocketed $75.5 million. Vietnam’s national oil and gas group PetroVietnam has a 51 percent stake in Vietsovpetro with the rest held by Russia's state-run Zarubezhneft.

Tu Thanh Nghia, deputy director of Vietsovpetro, said that crude oil prices have yet to show any signs of a recovery, but the company had cut costs and improved efficiency to reach its goals.

Vietsovpetro was established in 1981 under an inter-governmental agreement between the then Soviet Union and PetroVietnam.

Over the last 35 years, Vietsovpetro has exploited about 220 million tons of crude oil, accounting for 62 percent of oil output in Vietnam. The company has also contributed more than $35 billion to the state budget and made a profit of some $22 billion.

Related news:

> Vietnam’s top lawmaker questions plan to pump more oil to boost GDP

> PetroVietnam’s contribution to state budget falls on low oil prices