Oil giant Saudi Aramco said Sunday it earned a $161 billion profit last year, attributing its earnings to higher crude oil prices.

The firm said in its annual report that the profit represented “its highest annual profits as a listed company.”

“Given that we anticipate oil and gas will remain essential for the foreseeable future, the risks of underinvestment in our industry are real — including contributing to higher energy prices,” Saudi Aramco CEO and President Amin H. Nasser said in a statement.

Nasser said Aramco would spend $37.6 billion to expand its production capacity.

Aramco also declared a dividend of $19.5 billion for the fourth quarter of 2022, to be paid in the first quarter of this year.

In 2021, Aramco declared profits of $110 billion, as compared to $49 billion in 2020 when the world faced the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, travel disruptions and oil prices briefly going negative.

Benchmark Brent crude oil now trades around $82 a barrel, though prices had reached over $120 a barrel back in June.

Aramco announced a record $42.4 billion profit in the third quarter of 2022 off the back of that price spike.

Source: National News Agency – Lebnon