Sinopec profit slides 22% as lower oil prices outweigh higher refining

• Sinopec (NYSE:SNP) says its H1 net profit fell 22% Y/Y to 25.39B yuan ($3.96B) from 32.5B yuan a year earlier, as sharply lower crude oil prices hurt upstream earnings.
• SNP's total H1 oil and gas production fell 1.8% Y/Y to 233M boe, driven lower by falling domestic crude production; H1 refinery throughput rose 2.7% to 118.9M metric tons.
• "Upstream performance remains an area of concern with declining domestic oil and gas production,” says Bernstein's Neil Beveridge, but he adds that the company should benefit from improved downstream performance due to lower feedstock prices for the rest of the year.