Santos Ltd (ASX: STO) has been busy paying off debt, cutting costs, slashing dividends and reducing capital investment despite the price rise trend for oil.
Santos was down 3.2% at $5.20 as the market opened on February 5 – mostly in the red due to drops in the Dow Jones and other US indices on Friday.
Santos is a natural gas producer for Australia, Indonesia and other Asian markets with operations in oil exploration, LNG and the marketing of hydrocarbons.
Santos released a fourth quarter activity report on January 24, highlighting its net debt reduction of US $2.7billion – down from $3.5 billion at the end of 2016. It also recorded capital expenditure of US$682 million – with total sales revenue jumping 20% to US$3.1 billion.
The new disciplined framework will likely see a respectably-improved full-year result logged on February 21, leaving Santos in a strong position as it works to focus on growth opportunities in PNG and Narrabri, while ramping up drilling in the Cooper Basin and GLNG.
