Saudi Arabia’s mostly state-owned oil company Saudi Aramco posted a 73.4% drop in profits for the second quarter of 2020 compared to April through June 2019. The decline, which was steeper than expected, was blamed on the coronavirus pandemic and the resulting fall in fuel use. “The COVID-19 crisis is unlike anything the world has experienced in recent history and we are adapting to a highly complex and rapidly changing business environment,” Amin Nasser, CEO of the giant firm, said in a statement issued on Sunday. Market analysts had expected the company to post a Q2 net profit of 31.3 billion riyals ($8.35 billion), down from 92.6 billion the year before, but actual profits totaled only 24.6 billion. Oil companies everywhere have posted major profit drops, but Saudi Aramco went partially public only last December by floating what turned out to be $29.4 billion worth of shares. It has pledged to distribute $18.75 billion in dividends for the quarter. It is considered the world’s second-most highly valued publicly traded company after Apple.
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