Higher oil price and weak rand help Sasol
The company, which a year ago was under a lot of pressure to reduce costs due to the lower oil price, is close to completing a review of assets to either sell or close
South Africa's biggest petrochemicals business Sasol finds itself in a sweet spot and is no longer under immense pressure to aggressively cut costs, due to the much improved oil price and the weakening of the rand this year. Stephen Cornell, Sasol joint CEO, said this week the increase in the oil price had helped the business's margins while "on the rand-dollar, a weaker rand actually is in our favour. That is because we do operations overseas and we'll generate profitability in dollars and in euros and when you bring back those into your accounting, you get more rand," Cornell said. The oil price is currently at $76.52 a barrel while the rand has weakened by 9% so far this year. Cornell was speaking at the opening of a new Sasol coal mine, Shondoni in Mpumalanga, on Thursday. The mine is part of a R14-billion programme to replace 60% of Sasol's ageing coal mines in the Secunda area. The company, which a year ago was under a lot of pressure to reduce costs due to the lower oil price...
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