Swedish oil company P.A. resources reported fourth-quarter 2008 profit on Wednesday of 387.33 million kroner ($46.7 million), a result helped by the $220 million sale in December of its Norwegian offshore business.

The result produced earnings per share of 2.66 Swedish krona, a 32 percent hike over last year’s earnings.

“The divestment (of the Norway business) has lead to that our total production has decreased, but it will increase again in the second half of the year with the production from the Azurite field,” said chief exec Ulrik Jansson in a communique.

The result came despite a halving of revenue year-on-year to 371 million Swedish krona.

But P.A. in January took hold of the proceeds from last year’s 1.16 billion kroner convertible bond issued despite the swirling dark clouds of worldwide financial crisis.

P.A. said profit for the year was down over 20 million kroner from 2007 to 925.5 million kroner ($111.3 million).

Tags: P.A. Resources