Saudi Aramco to invest $120bn

State-owned Saudi Aramco plans to invest around $120 billion (Dh440.77bn) over the next five to six years in developing projects in the oil and petrochemicals sectors, the company's chief executive told Arabiya TV.

The world's top oil exporter has completed several refinery expansions and is now work to meet the country's gas demands in addition to moving downstream into production of petrochemicals.

Saudi Aramco plans to spend $60bn in the oil sector while the remaining investment will be for developing petrochemical projects and foreign investments, said Khalid Al Falih.

"Over the next five to six years Aramco will invest a total of around $120bn," he said. "Funding for our other projects will come from joint ventures, loans and individual Saudi investors."

The world's top oil exporter completed a huge expansion plan to boost crude output capacity last year at a time when world oil demand fell with the global recession, leaving the kingdom with a larger-than-expected buffer to meet any future demand increase or surprise outage in global supply.

Global oil demand was "fluctuating" and incremental demand growth is expected to come from China, India and the Middle East, Falih said.

Saudi is the only oil producer in the world with significant spare capacity that can be deployed quickly. It's oil output capacity stood at 12.5 million barrels per day (bpd), Falih said.

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