A top Russian official says the country’s pension funds are considering investing in Saudi Arabian state oil major Aramco when it lists its stock, stressing that the move will be meant to strengthen the partnership between the world's two top oil producers.
"We see great interest in the Aramco IPO from Russian pension funds as well as from our Chinese partners," said Kirill Dmitriev, the head of Russia's Direct Investment Fund.
Dmitriev said he could not disclose the names of the funds or the amount they were prepared to invest.
He emphasized that the deal would help strengthen growing cooperation with Riyadh, stressing that Moscow and Riyadh needed to coordinate oil policies for many more years.
"Extending such cooperation for many more years would be very useful for the market. It has proven its efficiency, when we were targeting balancing supply and demand rather than targeting a particular oil price," Dmitriev was quoted as saying by Reuters.
He further said oil producers had generated an extra $600 billion in revenues thanks to oil cuts and higher prices over the past year. This, added the office, had allowed producers to resume investments and guarantee no supply shortages in the future.
Dmitriev said a deal between Russian and Saudi Arabia over investing in Aramaco could pave the way for dialogue on many other fronts.
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman announced last year that the kingdom was considering listing about 5 percent of Aramco in 2018 in a deal that could raise $100 billion, if the company is valued at about $2 trillion as hoped.
The initial public offering (IPO) of Saudi Aramco is the centerpiece of an economic reform plan to diversify the Saudi economy beyond oil and it would also provide a welcome boost to the kingdom's budget which has been hit by low oil prices.
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