Saudi SABIC Q1 Profit Falls 1.8 % On Product Prices

 

Profit at Saudi Basic Industries Corp (SABIC), one of the world's biggest petrochemical firms, slipped 1.8 percent in the first quarter of this year as lower product prices offset rises in production and sales volumes.

SABIC made a net profit of 6.44 billion riyals ($1.72 billion) between January and March compared to 6.56 billion riyals a year earlier, it said in a statement on Sunday.

The result was slightly below the average forecast of analysts polled by Reuters, who had predicted a quarterly profit of 6.79 billion riyals. <ID:nL6N0N80UP>

(Reporting by Mirna Sleiman; Writing by Andrew Torchia)