RusEnergy

MOSCOW, January 13 (RIA Novosti) - Taking into account LUKOIL's holdings in its subsidiaries and foreign projects, the group's preliminary output was 86.3 million tons of oil in 2004, says a LUKOIL press release circulated after a recent meeting of LUKOIL's board of directors. Of the above output, 82.8 million tons were produced in Russia and 3.5 million tons were yielded by foreign projects the company pursues. As was highlighted during the meeting, the company operated in 2004 against a backdrop of favourable oil prices on the world's market, however, virtually all hard-currency earnings from Urals oil's price hike beyond $25 a barrel ended up in the governmental coffers as a result of adjusting the tax rates. Natural gas output grew last year by 8.9%, exceeding 6.2 billion cu.m. In 2004, LUKOIL's gas treatment facilities handled about 2.2 billion cu.m of associated gas. Preliminary data show that the company's oil refineries processed about 43.8 million tons of crude. The processing volume increased by almost 1.5 million tons over 2003. LUKOIL's refineries in Russia increased their output by 3% to 35.3 million tons. The plants abroad handled over 8.4 million tons of oil stock, which is a 6.2% increase over 2003. LUKOIL Group's net profit in 2004 is preliminarily estimated at about $4 billion, which is a 60% hike over the net profit earned in 2003, exclusive of the sale of its holdings in the Azeri-Chirag-Gyuneshli project. Retail sales of oil products via the company's gas station network climbed by 17% to account for 2.8 million tons. A daily oil product sales per a LUKOIL gas station increased by 16.7% to total 6.3 tons. LUKOIL Group's 2004 investment spending numbered $4.1 billion, according to non-audited data gathered by means of the corporate investment record methodology. In line with preliminary data, the total sum of taxes and duties paid by LUKOIL to the federal and regional budgets of the Russian Federation in 2004 stands at about RR261.6 billion, or $9 billion. This is twice as much as the average LUKOIL Group net profit anticipated. The group paid RR3,140, or $109, in taxes and duties per ton of oil extracted in Russia. The sum of taxes and duties paid in 2003 increased by more than 50% over that paid in 2003.