Dateline 2018-06-13, The Edge:
ONCE again, there is talk of a possible flotation of national oil company Petroliam Nasional Bhd (Petronas). Speculation about such a move makes the rounds every few years. Listing Petronas, it is said, could be one way to help cut down the country’s debt, which has breached the RM1 trillion mark, or a little more than 80% of gross domestic product.
But will it take place?
“It was first mooted some 10 years or so ago by merchant bankers when the government was looking to attract foreigners to invest in Malaysia … it was the same time Synergy Drive (which later morphed into Sime Darby Bhd around 2007) was created. It involved the merger of Kumpulan Guthrie, Golden Hope and Sime Darby. A plantation giant was created but did it achieve what it was supposed to do? Did foreign investors come flocking in?” asks a director of an oil and gas company.\
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