Abu Dhabi's International Petroleum Investment Co (IPIC) saw its first-half profit nearly triple as the energy-focused investment vehicle posted gains on its financial investments, an updated bond prospectus showed.     

IPIC, which has stakes in Spain's Cepsa and Austrian oil group OMV, posted a $424 million gain on financial instruments, compared with a loss of $1.1 billion for the year-ago period, boosting profit after tax to $1.16 billion from $413 million a year ago.

Revenue rose 17 percent to $8.63 billion. 

State-owned IPIC, which has $61.8 billion in total assets, gave a 7.3 billion dirhams ($2 billion) interest-free loan to its unit Aabar in September, the prospectus showed. Unlisted IPIC had raised the funds via an unsecured conventional loan, it said.

Aabar bought Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank's (ADCB) 25 percent stake in Malaysian group RHB Capital earlier this year. Sources told Reuters earlier this month that Aabar would get a $1.9 billion loan through its parent IPIC from ADCB to pay for the deal.

The prospectus also showed Aabar has raised its stake in Virgin Galactic to 37.8 percent from 31.8 percent after investing a further $110 million in the company.

IPIC, which has a mandate to invest in the energy sector, had a total debt of $31.8 billion, according to the prospectus.
 It has received six equity contributions from Abu Dhabi totalling $3.5 billion since inception, the last of which was in 2008.

IPIC will kick off investor meetings in Germany on October 19 for a potential bond issue.  - Reuters