MELBOURNE, April 20 (Reuters) - Australia's Santos Ltd STO.AX reported a 14 percent rise in sales revenue for the first quarter on Thursday, bolstered by a sharp increase in oil prices, and flagged it has cut its break-even costs further and made more progress on cutting debt.
Santos said its free cash flow break-even has been cut to $34 a barrel, down 28 percent since the start of last year.
Revenue rose to $684 million in the March quarter from $600 million a year earlier, as average realised oil prices shot up by 56 percent to $57.60 a barrel, offsetting a 13 percent drop in sales volumes to 18.6 million barrels of oil equivalent.
Sales revenue beat a forecast of $643 million from Royal Bank of Canada, while the sales volume was roughly in line with RBC analysts' estimate.
While overall production fell, Santos highlighted an improvement at its troubled Gladstone liquefied natural gas (LNG) project, with gas volumes sold to the LNG plant jumping nearly 28 percent.
Santos cut net debt by $500 million from the end of last year to $3.1 billion, making progress on its target to reduce net debt by $1.5 billion by the end of 2019.