13 Dec 2010 15:12

Lukoil to boost investment in 2011 - Alekperov

MOSCOW. Dec 13 (Interfax) - Oil company Lukoil plans to increased investment in 2011 in comparison with 2010, the company's president, Vagit Alekperov, told Interfax.

"The production plan for next year is no less than for this year but investment will be more," he said.

Alekperov also said that U.S. company ConocoPhillips currently retains around 3% of the shares in Lukoil.

Lukoil's capital expenditures for January-September 2010 came to $4.719 billion, which was a year-on-year increase of 0.8%. The company's oil output came to 97.6 million tonnes and 14.9 billion cubic meters of gas in 2009. The company planned to increased hydrocarbon output by 1%-2% this year. Lukoil's oil production went down by 1.4% year-on-year to 72.27 million tonnes in January-September. Production of hydrocarbons came to 2,249 barrels equivalent per day, which was a year-on-year increase of 1.6%.

At the end of October, Alekperov said that Lukoil's investment for the next five to six years will come to over $10 billion annually. He also said that Lukoil would produce over 90 million tonnes of oil in 2010.

Conoco earlier owned 20% in Lukoil but decided at the start of the year to sell its stake. Lukoil signed agreement with Conoco to acquire 7.6%. An additional 11.61% in depositary receipts for Lukoil shares were included in an option effective until September 26, 2010.

Conoco said that it received $6.4 billion from the sale of Lukoil shares in January-September 2010. As of September, Conoco held around 50 million shares in the Russian company, which equals around 5.9% of its charter capital. Therefore, the U.S. company, which earlier owned 20%, sold 14.1% (around 119.9 million shares) in Lukoil. Conoco has plans to sell its remaining stake by the end of 2011.