The China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC) Limited announced Tuesday that its net profit surged 68.6 percent year over year to a historical high of 11.83 billion yuan (Chinese currency) (1.46 billion US dollars) for the six months ended June 30, 2005.

The company's net production increased 14.9 percent from the same period of last year to 420,325 barrels of oil equivalent (BOE) per day during the period.

For the period, the company's oil and gas sales increased 54 percent to 24.73 billion yuan (3.06 billion US dollars), as a result of both production growth and a year over year increase of 36.4 percent in realized oil price to 43.91 US dollars.

For the six months ended June 30, 2005, CNOOC produced approximately 356,826 barrels of oil and 369 million cubic feet of natural gas per day. Its net production offshore China increased 20.1 percent to 383,583 BOE per day, in line with the company's full year target.

Chairman and CEO of the company Fu Chengyu commented, "Both the high oil price environment and well managed operation contributed to CNOOC Ltd's record results. We continued achieving remarkable organic production growth in the last six months."

Source: Xinhua