Saudi Aramco, the world's biggest oil company, on Wednesday (April 11th) announced a $44 billion deal to build a giant refinery complex in India with three Indian firms, AFP reported.
The refinery at Ratnagiri on the west coast will be able to handle up to 1.2 million barrels of oil a day, the Saudi company said in a statement after signing a memorandum of understanding with Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum Corporation and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation.
The complex "will rank among the largest world refining and petrochemicals projects and will be designed to meet India's fast-growing fuels and petrochemicals demand. The project cost is estimated at around $44 billion".
Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum have set up a joint venture for the deal with Aramco, Ratnagiri Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd.
Aramco said it may "seek to include a strategic partner to co-invest in the mega refinery".
Meanwhile, the hotly-awaited stock market debut of Aramco will be launched in 2018 if market conditions permit, otherwise in 2019, the kingdom's finance minister said Tuesday.
"If the market is ready in 2018, we will go in 2018. If not, we will wait until 2019," Mohammed al-Jadaan told AFP, referring to the planned initial public offering (IPO) of shares in Aramco, tipped to be the world's biggest.
"We are not desperate for listing. We will only list when the market is right," he said.
