* Capex focus on replacing ageing assets-Petronas CEO
* Carrying out studies on uncoventional oil and gas
* Crude oil to stay above $100 for next two months (Adds details, quotes and background)
By Niki Koswanage and Julie Goh
KUALA LUMPUR, March 2 (Reuters) - Malaysia's Petronas could spend up to 275 billion ringgit ($90.6 billion) over the next five years as the state oil giant seeks to boost its stable of high-yielding oil assets and secure profit growth, its chief said on Wednesday.
Petronas joins firms such as ExxonMobil in planning to raise capital expenditure, spurred by high crude prices and energy demand recovering with the global economy, even as it warned about volatile oil that could stay above $100 on the Middle East turmoil and its impact on inflation.
Annual capital spending of the company, which manages Malaysia's energy reserves, will range from 50 billion ringgit to 55 billion ringgit over the next five years, up from 40 billion ringgit in the current fiscal year, Petronas Chief Executive Shamsul Azhar told reporters on Wednesday.
"If we do not grow, we will become irrelevant," Shamsul told reporters after announcing the firm's strong third-quarter results. "For the next five years, our capital expenditure is going to be higher. All those ageing assets need to replaced."
As a result, the firm's dividend payouts to the government may not increase from the 30 billion ringgit level despite higher oil prices, Shamsul said, signalling Petronas was racing to keep up with other oil majors in terms of capital outlays.
In the year to March 2010 it kicked in 57.6 billion ringgit to federal revenues in terms of dividends and taxes. It's debt is more highly rated than the sovereign state, leading analysts to dub Malaysia as a "subsidiary of Petronas."
