(LEAD) S-Oil Q3 net drops 56 pct on stronger won

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By Nam Kwang-sik
SEOUL, Oct. 22 (Yonhap) -- S-Oil Corp., South Korea's third-largest refiner, said
Thursday its third-quarter net profit fell 56 percent on-year as the local
currency gained against the U.S. dollar.
Net income came to 66.7 billion won (US$56.6 million) in the July-September
period, compared with 150 billion won a year ago, S-Oil said in a regulatory
filing.
Sales dropped 33 percent year-on-year to 4.71 trillion won during the same period
while the refiner posted an operating loss of 70.5 billion won.
The South Korean won rose about 3.8 percent versus the greenback in the third
quarter from the previous quarter.
Shares of S-Oil fell 2.61 percent to 59,800 won as of 11:16 a.m. on the Seoul
bourse.
During the period, S-Oil completed 32 percent of its 1.4 trillion-won plant
expansion project to build two petrochemical plants in Ulsan, an industrial city
about 400km southeast of Seoul, S-Oil said. The two plans are slated to be
completed by June 2011.
The refiner predicts that global demand for oil products will rise about 1.5
percent this year from the previous year, helped by rising demand in emerging
markets.
ksnam@yna.co.kr
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