Numerous foreign investors are lining up for Dung Quat Oil Refinery’s shares at its initial public offering (IPO) expected at the end of 2017.

This was shared by Tran Ngoc Nguyen, general director of Binh Son Refining and Petrochemical Co., Ltd. (BSR), the operator of Dung Quat Refinery, with Vnexpress.

“Numerous foreign investors, including Thailand’s PTT, and Kuwait Petroleum Corp., and Singaporean enterprise, have expressed interest in buying a stake in the refinery. Representatives of BSR and these firms will carry out negotiations in the upcoming time,” Nguyen said.

“Especially in early January, Russian Gazprom Neft decided to end talks to buy a 49 per cent stake in Dung Quat refinery, however, when BRS released the IPO plan, the group once again expressed interest in buying Dung Quat Refinery shares,” Nguyen added.

The company is also hiring consultants to build its equitisation plan and calculate its corporate value, as well as the auctioned shares’ initial offering price. The Prime Minister’s decision to allow BSR to calculate its own selling price is considered to create a platform for attracting domestic and foreign investors to the company’s IPO.

The equitisation will help BSR to collect capital for its expansion into the petrochemical sector. Previously, BSR released plans to take up a $1.2 billion loan to enhance and expand Dung Quat Refinery.

The expansion is expected to be completed in 2020 with a total investment capital of $1.82 billion, 30 per cent of which will be equity and the remaining 70 would be covered from loans.

Upon completion, the expanded refinery’s capacity will increase by two million tonnes a year, to 8.5 million tonnes. It will be able to meet half of Vietnam’s fuel demand.

Since commercial operations began at the refinery in February 2009, BSR has imported 47 million tonnes of crude oil to produce 42 million tonnes of products, including propylene, polypropylene, liquefied petroleum gas, and gasoline, as well as kerosene, diesel, and jet fuel.

Nine months into the year, BSR earned VND51.89 trillion ($2.32 billion) in revenue, equalling 63 per cent of the annual target, however, it achieved a VND1.04 trillion ($46.5 million) profit, equalling 130 per cent of the target.

VIR