POSCO Int’l to invest $760 mn in energy business in 2024

POSCO International Corp., a South Korean general trading and energy exploration company, will invest 1 trillion won ($760 million) in its energy business in 2024 to solidify its position as a global trading company, doubling its spending on the sector last year.

“Global expansion will be our keyword in 2024 and we will strengthen the value chain of major businesses to further advance our business," it said on Friday.

It plowed 537.6 billion won into its energy business last year.

For the upstream energy sector, it will expand the production capacity of natural gas by three times at Senex Energy Ltd. POSCO International purchased a 50.1% stake in the Australian gas producer in 2022.

POSCO has already secured orders from eight companies in Australia, including AGL Energy, Aurora Energy and  E-Australia to supply 150 petajoules (PJ) of natural gas in aggregate. One PJ is equal to 3,666 tons.

In the midstream sector, or energy transportation, it will build its seventh and eighth energy tanks to store 200,000 tons of natural gas by 2026.

RENEWABLE ENERGY

POSCO International is also aiming to secure licenses for offshore wind power development on the west, southwest and southeast coasts of South Korea by 2030 to generate 2-gigawatt electricity in aggregate.

For driving motor cores installed in electric vehicles, it will expand the global production capacity to more than 7 million units by 2030 to meet demand.

It is considering breaking ground for its second driving motor core plant in Mexico and another one in Poland in the first half of this year. It completed its first driving motor core plant in Mexico last year.

It has already secured orders of 2.86 million units of driving motor cores for shipment this year, outstripping the 2.25 million units it received for transportation in 2023.

For food trading, it will import a total of 1.8 million tons of food and foodstuffs this year.

POSCO International is seeking to set up agricultural joint ventures in Australia and the US. It will break ground for a palm oil refining plant in Indonesia in collaboration with GS Caltex Corp. within the first half of this year.

It reaped its highest-ever operating profit of 1.2 trillion won ($880 million) in 2023, up 28.9% from a year earlier. By contrast, sales decreased 12.8% on-year to 33.1 trillion won.

For shareholder-friendly management, it will return a quarter of its consolidated net profit to shareholders in dividends starting this year. It will also consider introducing quarterly dividend payments.

Write to Hyung-Kyu Kim at khk@hankyung.com
 


Yeonhee Kim edited this article.