Sky-high prices yield a rise in trust

www.canoe.ca Saturday, January 25, 2003 By CP

FORT MCMURRAY -- Sky-high oil prices, higher output and lower operating costs at Syncrude Canada drove Canadian Oil Sands Trust's fourth-quarter 2002 earnings to $94.5 million -- almost triple the amount earned in the same period last year.

"The benefit of robust crude oil prices was optimized by solid, steady operations at Syncrude in the second half of the year," Marcel Coutu, the trust's president and chief executive officer, said in a statement to investors.

Syncrude president Jim Carter acknowledged the trust's bonanza has a lot to do with continued instability in the Middle East over fears of a U.S.-led war on Iraq and a general strike that has crippled Venezuela's oil production.

"There's not really an awful lot we can do at this end about the price of oil," said Carter.

"All we can really do is keep getting our costs down and our production up."