Africa Oil & Gas: Angola’s Sonangol gets funding from British bank

Angola State oil company, Sonangol, contracted a loan worth U$ 1 Bi with Standard Chartered Bank to finance operating expenses in 2015, according to the annual report published recently and quoted by angolan newspaper Novo Jornal.

The loan has a repayment period of five years and was contracted in a year of strong financial difficulties for Angola oil, which resulted in the break to half of the revenue from oil exports, wrote the Angolan newspaper Novo Jornal.

The annual report admits that due to the “financial position and consolidated results of the Sonangol Group,” taking into account the results of 2015 “could not fully comply with the financial covenants required” in credit agreements, such as debt ratios.

The loan joins other previous transactions between Standard Chartered Bank and Sonangol worth 3.5 billion dollars in two loans to 84 months granted in 2014 and is justified in the document due to the need of efforts to finance structural capital projects and other operating expenses” of the state group in the oil sector.

The document states that Sonangol net debt amounted to U$7.5 billion on December 31, 2015, higher than 2 billion dollars over the same period last year.

Long-term debt represented 76% of Sonangol total debt at the end of 2015.

The state oil company closed the year 2015 with assets of U$38.2 billion and a total capital of U$15.2 billion, including U$284 million of net profit. (source: Edited by MRP; Macauhub / AO)