 Rosneft is now one of Russia's top three oil companies |
State-owned Russian oil firm Rosneft may buy more assets from troubled rival Yukos, it said, as it revealed 2005 earnings were up fourfold. The group said net profit for last year quadrupled to $3.986bn (�2.3bn).
Its figures were boosted by output from Yukos' former core oil unit, Yugansk, which it took over in late 2004.
Rosneft became Russia's third-biggest oil firm when it bought Yugansk after it was seized from Yukos to settle an unpaid tax bill.
Rosneft also said it aimed to double its production to 2.9 billion barrels (bpd) per day by 2015.
It plans to reach the figure in stages, initially boosting production from 1.5 million barrels per day in 2005 to 2.0 mpd in 2010.
In response to questions about Yukos, Rosneft President Sergei Bogdanchikov said: "If something interesting appears on the market, we will look at it."
Rosneft also says it hoped to raise up to $20bn later this year, in what could be the world's biggest-ever initial public offering.
That would beat Japanese mobile phone operator NTT DoCoMo's $18bn IPO in 1998.