Petron to benefit from PNOC-EDC offering

Philippine National Oil Co. (PNOC) is planning to use a portion of the proceeds from the PNOC-Energy Development Corp. initial public offering (IPO) to infuse additional equity to oil refiner Petron Corp., industry sources said.

They said PNOC could use up some $30 million or about P1.5 billion of the IPO proceeds to answer Petron’s call for more capital to expand its refinery operation.

Petron will need $300 million for its refinery expansion. Of this total project cost, 70 percent would be raised through loan and 30 percent through equity.

The equity portion of the project cost will be jointly shouldered by the two major stockholders – PNOC and Saudi Arabian Oil Co. (Saudi Aramco) at $30 million each.

Of the P16 billion net proceeds from the IPO, P8 billion will go to EDC and P8 billion will be split by PNOC, EDC’s mother company, and the National Government.

PNOC president and CEO Pedro Aquino Jr., in a separate interview, has confirmed that Petron has been asking its shareholders to infuse additional equity to support its expansion program.

"But there is one big item we will look into — it’s our investment in Petron. We’re still trying to conduct preliminary discussions with Petron, as we still don’t know how much they need — whether we will put some new equity — so it’s still in the preliminary stage. We have had talks with Petron, but there’s nothing concrete yet, as whatever plans that will be arrived at will have to be brought to the board for approval. We’re still a 40-percent holder in Petron," he said.

Aquino said there was an instance in the past that they thought of selling a five-percent stake in Petron to be able to raise capital for the refinery upgrade and modernization.

"This proposal is also being looked at very seriously by PNOC and Petron. But as much as possible, we want to keep our 40 percent stake in Petron so that would be the least of the schemes we might consider to raise capital," he said.