Plunging oil prices have pushed Chile’s state energy company, Enap to a $958m loss in 2008 after a $98m profit the previous year, the company says.

The group, Chile’s second-largest after state copper giant Codelco, supplies four-fifths of the country’s energy and had already primed the market to expect unprecedented losses of more than $800m. The disastrous results, just as Chile’s economy is slowing sharply, prompted former chief executive Enrique Dávila to quit at the end of December.