German gas company Uniper, which was nationalized last year after Russian gas supplies were cut off, said Wednesday it no longer needed new capital aid from the state, on the sidelines of an announcement that it had returned to profit in the first quarter.
The group says it “did not incur additional losses in the first quarter of 2023 due to the purchase of replacement gas volumes” and therefore “does not require further capital injections from the German government at this time,” according to a statement announcing preliminary results from January to March.
This statement comes a day after Vladimir Putin signed a decree allowing the Russian authorities to introduce a provisional administration for assets held by certain foreign companies in Russia, including Uniper. For the German group, this concerns the production of electricity in Russia through its subsidiary Unipro. Uniper no longer has control over this subsidiary, for which a local buyer has been found in 2022. This operation has not yet received the green light from the Russian authorities.
Uniper found itself asphyxiated last year after Russian gas supplies were completely cut off, forcing the main customer of Russia’s Gazprom to buy on the spot market where prices had soared. Since then, gas prices have fallen and the company is once again able to balance its operations, which also include the delivery of electricity to wholesale customers and municipal authorities. As gas prices remain volatile, “future losses due to the purchase of replacement gas volumes and respective potential equity injections cannot be ruled out in the future,” warns the group, which is 99% owned by the German state and the rest by large investors.
Uniper reported on Wednesday an adjusted operating profit (Ebit) of €749 million for the first quarter just ended, the first positive one since the end of 2021, compared with a loss of €917 million in the first quarter of 2022, which ushered in a black year. The adjusted Ebit for 2022 of Germany’s largest gas importer came out at -10.9 billion euros, all figures excluding the Unipro business which has been deconsolidated.
Adjusted net income amounted to 451 million euros from January to March, compared with a loss of 674 million euros a year ago. For the year 2023, Uniper says it expects a “strong recovery in earnings compared to last year, resulting in positive adjusted Ebit and adjusted net income.” The group will publish its detailed results for the quarter on May 4.
