Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) and its business partner OCI are preparing for a potential listing of Fertiglobe, their fertilizer manufacturing joint venture (JV).
ADNOC owns a 42 percent stake in Fertiglobe, with OCI holding the remaining 58 percent. Egyptian billionaire Mr. Nassef Sawiris is the largest shareholder in OCI, which is listed on the Euronext Amsterdam exchange. Mr. Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, holds a 6 percent stake in the company.
“ADNOC regularly assesses investment and partnership opportunities across its entire value chain and is currently exploring several potential opportunities, including a potential listing of Fertiglobe, our fertilizer JV business with OCI,” a spokesman for the company pointed out.
In 2019, ADNOC’s fertilizer arm and OCI’s Middle East nitrogen fertilizer business merged to form the export-focused nitrogen fertilizer business. Fertiglobe is based in Abu Dhabi’s Global Market. The company’s Chairman is Dr. Sultan Al Jaber, the ADNOC Group’s Chief Executive, and Managing Director.
The ADNOC spokesman stated that “in less than two years, a global fertilizer player was created, based in Abu Dhabi. As ADNOC continues to deliver on its 2030 growth strategy, we will continue to evaluate investment and partnership opportunities that create value and drive sustainable growth for Abu Dhabi and the UAE.”
In a disclosure to the Euronext when reporting its first-quarter results earlier this week, OCI reported that it is planning for a listing of Fertiglobe.
The fertilizer joint venture was established following ADNOC’s plans in 2019 that it will invest $44.9 billion in developing its downstream business over the next five years. The move coincided with a rising trend among Middle Eastern oil exporters to diversify their product portfolios.
As it seeks to diversify income streams and bring in foreign capital to grow its business, ADNOC has been looking for ways to monetize some of its non-core assets.
ADNOC’s gas pipelines attracted a consortium of the world’s leading infrastructure and sovereign wealth funds last year. In the year 2020, the $20.7 billion contractwas the biggest in the energy sector. This came after a deal in 2019 to sell a stake in its oil pipelines.
Last year, the company raised money by selling a minority stakein its non-core property portfolio, as well as a 10 percent stake in its distribution business, which it floated in late 2017. The free float of its shares was doubled to 20 percent following an institutional placing in September of last year.
