Sinopec expects to acquire part of its parent's overseas assets before the year ends, said Wang Xinhua, chief financial officer (CFO) of the oil firm.

Wang said the good overseas assets of the Sinopec Group, the parent company of Sinopec Corp., would be injected into the listed company before the end of the year.

The Sinopec Group's overseas assets are mainly scattered in Russia, Australia and Canada. Its overseas oil equity production in 2008 was 9.01 million tons, taking up about one-third of Sinopec's total output. By the end of 2008, its overseas recoverable reserves reached 160 million tons.

It is expected that the Sinopec Group this year would see its overseas equity oil output reach 17.40 million tons.

The Sinopec Group this year acquired Addax Petroleum Corporation for $7.2 billion. Addax now is able to annually produce seven million tons of crude oil and it has found 37 oil and gas fields with 19 under operation.

Qiu Xiaofeng, an analyst with Merchants Securities, believes that the Sinopec Group's overseas assets are able to generate about 11.2 billion yuan of profit or 0.13 yuan EPS, if the oil price stays at 75 US dollars/barrel.

On the news, Founder Securities maintains its rating of "overweight" on Sinopec Corp. A-stock.

Sinopec Corp. during the first three quarters has seen its exploration and development sector gain profit of 12.981 billion yuan, the least compared with the refining and marketing sectors, which respectively yielded 21.557 billion yuan and 22.377 billion yuan.

Copyright 2009 Xinhua News Agency