Saudi Arabia is making contingency plans for a possible delay to the planned initial public offering (IPO) of up to five per cent of state oil company Saudi Aramco into 2019.

According to a report by Bloomberg, the government is still planning to proceed with the IPO in the second half of 2018, but is working on contingency plans in case the part-listing is delayed into early 2019.

The IPO of up to 5 per cent of Saudi Aramco is part of the kingdom’s ambitious economic reform programme under the Vision 2030 and National Transformation Plan (NTP). If Riyadh’s suggested $2 trillion valuation of Aramco is met, the IPO would raise up to $100bn for the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund Public Investment Fund (PIF).

Read here for more information and analysis of the planned IPO of Aramco.