Tasnee eyes acquisitions

OPPORTUNITIES AVAILABLE: Saudi petrochemical firm see domestic and international opportunities due to lower asset prices. (Getty Images)

Saudi industrial group Tasnee is looking at acquisition opportunities at home and abroad, due to lower asset prices in the wake of the global financial crisis, an executive said on Wednesday.

"We are looking. We have our own plans of expansion of our current activities," said Saleh Al-Nazha, Senior Vice President, told Reuters on the sidelines of the Euromoney conference in the Saudi capital, Riyadh. He declined to identify targets.

Nazha said the firm was considering selling Islamic bonds to fund growth, declining to be more specific.

Tasnee, which says it is Saudi Arabia's second-largest petrochemical company by output volume, is still waiting to hear from the government about building a $12 billion refinery in Jizan.

"We were considered as one of the candidates...The government said that they would give us feedback around September," said Nazha.

The government unveiled plans to build a Jizan refinery in 2006 and said it would be 100 percent privately owned with an initial public offering taking place once the refinery was deemed viable.

Since then the government has delayed tender bids for the 200,000-400,000 barrels-per-day oil refinery three times. (Reuters)

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