Oil got expensive this year, and Sasol's shares ran harder than almost anything else in the developing world. Bloomberg, which crunched the numbers, has it as the top-performing emerging-market stock outside Asia, with a dollar return of almost 120% so far in 2026. If that holds, it is on course for its best annual performance since at least 1991.
Why coal beats crude right now
The reason sits in Secunda. Sasol gets the majority of its oil output from coal, using its own coal-to-liquids technology, so it leans far less on Middle East crude than an ordinary refiner does. Adrian Hammond of SBG Securities told Bloomberg that while a conventional refiner would be paying around $100 a barrel for crude, Sasol gets its feedstock for a fraction of that and sells the finished product at market prices. Sasol, in other words, pays coal prices and gets oil prices. Synthetic fuel output at Secunda is running at five-year highs, and the plant beat the production guidance Sasol had given the market for the year to June.
A long way back from 2022
The rally looks bigger because of where it started. Between June 2022 and April 2025 the shares lost 85% of their value, after years of ballooning debt and delayed projects. Since the start of the second quarter of this year they have added more than 43%, while the local benchmark index slipped 1.9%.
Analysts are split on how much is left. Of the eleven tracked by Bloomberg, four say buy and two say sell, with an average price target of R238.01, a touch above the R231.60 the shares traded at on Monday. Hammond is at the far end, telling Bloomberg he expects the price to almost double over the next year to R450 because many local investors have overlooked the stock.
The dividend still waits on debt
Shareholders have not been paid to wait. Sasol declared no final dividend for the year to June, because net debt, down 11% to $3.3 billion, was still above the $3 billion line it has drawn before payouts can resume. Management has said further cuts to debt may let it pay a dividend for the first time in more than two years, Bloomberg reports.
Expensive oil is what is shrinking that debt, and it is also the risk. M&G's Aeysha Samsodien told Bloomberg that if prices stay high, Sasol can keep paying debt down. HSBC's Sriharsha Pappu, who rates the shares a buy, acknowledged that a reversal in the oil price could stall the run.
