TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - State-owned energy company Pertamina booked US$1 billion net profit in 2020, the equivalent of Rp14 trillion. Pertamina's president director, Nicke Widyawati, said that profits were obtained from a number of initiatives that succeeded in restoring the company's performance.

Among those initiatives were increasing in upstream oil and gas and refinery productivity, as well as efficiency in all areas — including a 30-percent cut of operational expenditure and reprioritizing investment budget allocations.

Nicke said that throughout 2020 Pertamina came under pressure, facing three sentiments at once; low world oil prices, weak demand, and exchange rate depreciation.

But the company managed to reserve supply when energy prices were down by buying in large quantities and storing them in landed and floating storages. This strategy was quite successful and had a positive impact on Pertamina's financial performance.

"Pertamina managed to score profits and this was an extraordinary effort. So, the energy sector must make extraordinary efficiency to make adjustments," Nicke said on Thursday, February 4, 2021.

This year, the company is planning to hold IPOs for a number of subsidiaries to raise funds from the capital market. "In the third and fourth quarters we will have an IPO (initial public offering) for one of our business units," she said.

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