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Chevron Sells 75 Percent Stake Of South Africa Assets To China For $1B

Chevron Sells 75 Percent Stake Of South Africa Assets To China For $1B

Sinopec, the new majority stakeholder in Chevron South Africa, is one of China’s major government-owned petroleum energy and chemicals companies.

Sinopec ranked No. 4 in the 2016 Fortune Global 500 ranking, with revenues of
$294.344 billion. By comparison, Walmart ranked No. 1 on the same list with $482 billion revenue. China’s State Grid — the world’s largest utility — ranked No. 2 — it invests heavily in solar farms, wind, and alternative energy sources. No. 3 on the list is also a Chinese government owned entity — China National Petroleum.

From Reuters. Reporting by Meng Meng and Beijing Monitoring Desk and Wendell Roelf in Cape Town; editing by Himani Sarkar and Elaine Hardcastle.

China’s Sinopec will pay almost $1 billion for a 75 percent stake in Chevron Corp’s South African assets and its subsidiary in Botswana to secure its first major refinery in Africa, the companies announced on Wednesday.

China Petroleum and Chemical Corp, or Sinopec, Asia’s largest oil refiner, said the assets include a 100,000 barrel-per-day oil refinery in Cape Town, a lubricants plant in Durban as well as 820 petrol stations and other oil storage facilities.

Chevron Global Energy Inc said in a statement that Sinopec’s bid was selected in part because of the better terms and conditions it offered, including a commitment to operate the businesses as going concerns and the opportunity to reap strategic value for its longer-term strategy in Africa.

The deal, which includes 220 convenience stores across South Africa and Botswana, is subject to regulatory approval.

With a growing middle class, demand in South Africa for refined petroleum has increased by nearly 5 percent annually over the past five years, to a current total of about 27 million tonnes, Sinopec said.

Sinopec in 2012 partnered South Africa’s national oil company PetroSA to help develop a new greenfields refinery that has subsequently been shelved due to high costs. It said it would retain the whole workforce as well as the existing Caltex brand for the retail fuel stations for up to six years before launching a rebranding strategy.

The remaining 25 percent of the South African assets will continue to be held by a group of local shareholders, in accordance with South African regulations.

Reuters reported on Friday that Sinopec was the last remaining bidder in the auction which lasted more than a year and drew interest from French oil firm Total and commodity traders Glencore and Gunvor (both based in Switzerland).

Read more at Reuters.