Third quarter a 22% improvement from same period in 2017

EQUATE management team

KUWAIT: The EQUATE Group, a global producer of petrochemicals, reported its 3Q 2018 earnings yesterday. For the third quarter of 2018, EQUATE Group achieved $406 million in net profit, reflecting an increase of 22 percent from the same period in 2017. Revenue for the quarter was $1.2 billion, up 11 percent compared to 2017. EBITDA for the third quarter was $547 million, an increase of 12 percent compared to the same period in 2017.

"EQUATE's higher earnings in the third quarter of 2018 were a testament to the hard work and continued discipline and dedication of EQUATERs," said President & CEO of EQUATE Dr Ramesh Ramachandran. "We were able to capitalize on a good pricing environment in ethylene glycol (EG), polyethylene (PE) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) with highly reliable operations. Safety remains our number one priority in all that we do and we recently achieved over 62 million safe work hours. This has been an outstanding quarter."

Year to date in 2018, the Group realized a record breaking EBITDA of $1.7 billion, an increase of 26 percent, compared to the same period in 2017. Year to date net income was $1.3 billion, an increase of 44 percent over the same period in 2017.

The EQUATE Group is a global producer of petrochemicals and the world's second largest producer of ethylene glycol (EG). The Group owns and operates industrial complexes in Kuwait, North America and Europe that annually produce over 6 million tons of ethylene, EG, polyethylene (PE), polyethylene terephthalate (PET), styrene monomer (SM), paraxylene (PX), heavy aromatics (HA) and benzene (BZ). The EQUATE Group includes EQUATE Petrochemical Company (EQUATE), The Kuwait Olefins Company (TKOC), as well as a number of subsidiaries such as MEGlobal and Equipolymers. Their products are marketed throughout Asia, the Americas, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The Group's shareholders are Petrochemical Industries Company (PIC), The Dow Chemical Company (Dow), Boubyan Petrochemical Company (BPC) and Qurain Petrochemical Industries Company (QPIC).