Gazprom profits drop with its shares as final dividend not paid and as LNG replaces Russia's EU volumes
Gazprom, the Russian natural gas supplier hit by Western sanctions over the Ukraine invasion, saw its shares drop on the Moscow stock exchange after the board said the company would not be paying a dividend to shareholders as it reported a profits plunge.
Gazprom profits jump as pipeline prices and volumes increase with Europe and Asia demand surge
Gazprom, the Russian natural gas company supplying pipeline gas to Europe and China in competition to LNG, returned to a nine-month profit after a previous loss as the value of sales more than doubled and sales of gas increased by 18 percent in volume with the start of the partial global economic recovery.
Gazprom boosts profits and natural gas sales to Europe even ahead of Nord Stream II commercial start-up
Gazprom, the Russian natural gas company supplying pipeline gas to Europe and China in competition to LNG, posted much higher first-half profits as volume sales of gas increased by 18 percent with the start of the partial global economic recovery.
Gazprom fares worse than most LNG players as loss posted on weak rouble and sales plunge in Europe
Gazprom, the largest supplier of pipeline natural gas to Western Europe and a main competitor to LNG, posted a nine-month net loss because of the weak Russian currency and as revenues and prices also tumbled in Western European.
Gazprom’s total sales decreased by 139 trillion Russian roubles ($18.27 billion), or 25 percent, to 4.30 trillion roubles ($56.27Bln) for the nine months to the end of September.
“The change was mainly due to a decrease in average prices and volumes of gas sold in the ‘Europe and other countries’ segment,” said Gazprom in its earnings statement.
Gazprom posted a nine-month loss of 218.37 billion roubles ($2.86Bln) compared with a net profit of 1.05 trillion roubles ($13.72 billion) in the first nine months of 2019.
“The balance of foreign exchange differences reflected within the item ‘net finance (expenses) income’ produced a loss to the amount of 749.45 billion roubles for the nine months ended September 2020 compared to the gain in the amount of 230.81Bln roubles for the same period of the prior year. This fact had a major impact on the financial result of the Gazprom Group,” state the Russian company.
By the end of the nine-month reporting period at the end of September 2020, the rouble had dropped to a five-year low against the euro.
Net sales to Europe dropped to 1.13 trillion roubles ($14.83Bln) in the nine months from 1.88 trillion roubles ($24.67Bln) in the prior-year period.
Volumes sent to European pipelines also tumbled to 154.4 billion cubic metres, but still totalled just less than the entire LNG output of Australia and Qatar combined.
Gazprom said the average price charged in Europe dropped by around 34 percent in the period to 9.165 roubles ($120) per million cubic metres versus 13,966 roubles ($183M).
The company’s net sales to former nations of the former Soviet Union amount to 199.54 billion roubles ($2.61Bln).
The volumes amounted to 21.3 Bcm compared with 171.4 Bcm in the same nine months of 2019.
Pipeline natural gas sales in the Russian Federation during the period brought in revenues of 622.88 billion roubles ($8.15Bln) compared with 666.12Bln roubles ($8.72Bln) in the prior year period.
The volumes were just short of the total sent to Europe and came in at 151.1 Bcm versus 162.9 Bcm in 2019.
The average sales price for pipeline gas in the Russian Federation was less than half that for Europe at 4,122 roubles ($54) per mcm and little changed from 2019 when it was 4,089 roubles per mcm.
Gazprom is an LNG exporter, though on a limited scale of around 10 million tonnes per annum from the Sakhalin joint venture in the Russian Far East. The cargoes are mostly supplied under contract to Japanese utilities.
Gazprom also sells refined products, oil and natural gas condensate. Gazprom's new sales flow to China since the start of 2020 is still at a very low level in volume terms of 5 Bcm and is not mentioned in the earnings.
Gazprom reports loss
July 15 (LNGJ) - Gazprom, the main pipeline gas competitor to LNG in Europe and China, said first-quarter gas sales revenues dropped by 24 percent to 1.73 trillion roubles ($24.52 billion) compared with 2.29 trillion roubles ($32.3Bln) in the same period in 2019. The company reported a first-quarter net loss of 116 billion roubles ($1.64 Bln), compared with a net profit of 536Bln roubles ($7.5Bln) in the 2019 first quarter.
Overall natural gas sales dropped by 13 percent to 138.1 billion cubic metres from 158.9 Bcm in the 2019 first quarter. Gazprom said pipeline gas sales to Europe and China dropped to 51.6 Bcm in the first quarter from 62.4 Bcm in the same three months of 2019.
