Dana Gas, the Sharjah gas producer, has nearly tripled its first quarter profit on the back of sharply higher output from Egypt and Iraqi Kurdistan.
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The private-sector company, whose stock trades on the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange, posted net income of Dh92 million (US$25.07m) for the first three months of this year, up 180 per cent from the first quarter of last year. Revenue rose 50 per cent to Dh616m.
"This outcome is driven by [a] 34 per cent increase in production from Egypt and the Kurdistan region of Iraq," said Ahmed al Arbeed (CK), the chief executive of Dana.
A string of gas and condensate discoveries in Egypt's Nile Delta since 2007 has bolstered Dana's reserves as the company has rapidly expanded its output from the region that generates the bulk of its revenue. Dana announced its 22nd Egyptian gas strike earlier this month.
The company said it produced 4.25 million barrels of oil equivalent (boe) from Egypt during the first quarter, up 20 per cent from the comparable period of last year.
"We have continued our operations uninterrupted throughout the changes to the Egyptian political landscape," Mr al Arbeed noted.
In Kurdistan, Dana and its partners Crescent Petroleum (CK), OMV (CK) and MOL (CK) have recently completed a gas processing plant, enabling them to produce a sales stream of liquid petroleum gas (LPG). Previously the group supplied gas free of charge to local power plants while stripping out only condensate, a type of light oil, for separate sale.
Dana's 40 per cent share of gas, LPG and condensate production from the Khor Mor field in Kurdistan totalled 1.75 million boe in the most recent quarter, an 80 per cent increase from the January to March period of last year. The more gas the group pumps, the more liquids it can sell.
"Gas production from Khor More will increase as demand from the power stations increases and as new customers in the region are established," Dana predicted.
tcarlisle@thenational.ae
