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Bloomberg
Oil Search Ltd., the Papua New Guinea-focused energy explorer, raised its
full-year production target because
of record output from the country’s
liquefied natural gas project.
The company lifted the lower end of its 2017 production guidance to 29 million barrels of oil equivalent from the previous 28.5 million, while leaving the upper end at 30.5 million barrels, citing record output at PNG LNG, the company said in a statement.
“Lifting of the bottom end of production guidance is positive, although
we suspect given strong first-half production performance most had baked in top-of-the-range estimates,†Sydney-based RBC Capital Markets analyst
Ben Wilson said in a note.
Shares rose as much as 4.4 percent in Sydney to A$6.67, the biggest intraday gain since June 29, before paring their advance to 4 percent as of 12:05 p.m. local time. The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index added 0.2 percent.
Capital spending this year has been trimmed to a range of $350 million to $400 million from $380 million to $480 million due to cheaper drilling and synergies from working with Exxon Mobil Corp. on a planned LNG expansion. The Sydney-based company also said on Tuesday that net income in the January-June period rose more than fivefold to $129.1 million, barely missing the average $130.5 million from two analyst
estimates compiled by Bloomberg.