Good day. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Q2 2023 Neste Corporation Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the speaker's presentation, there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session, you will need to press star one and one on your telephone. You will hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question, please press star one and one again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Anssi Tammilehto. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Good afternoon, and welcome all to this conference call to discuss Neste's Q2 results published this morning. I am Anssi Tammilehto, Head of Neste Investor Relations, and here with me on the call are President and CEO, Matti Lehmus, CFO, Martti Alahärkönen, and the business unit heads, Carl Nyberg of Renewables Platform, Markku Korvenranta of Oil Products, and Panu Kopra of Marketing and Services. We will be referring to the presentation that can be found on our website. As always, please pay attention to the disclaimer, since we will be making forward-looking statements in this call. With these remarks, I would like to hand over to our President and CEO, Matti Lehmus, to start with the presentation. Matti, please go ahead.
Thank you. A good afternoon also on my behalf. It's great to have you all participating in this call. I am pleased that we were able to reach a solid, quarterly comparable EBITDA in the second quarter, and I would like to thank the Neste personnel for making this happen. As mentioned in our half-year financial report, our focus is on the ramp-up of our growth projects, and especially Singapore. The ramp-up progressed in the second quarter, although it was slowed down by a shutdown in June. Let me now move on to page four. In the second quarter, we were able to deliver a group comparable EBITDA of EUR 784 million, compared to EUR 1.085 billion last year.
In Renewable Products, we were able to reach a record high sales volume of 957 kilotons, with a clear 17% increase versus last year. Also, we were able to reach a sales margin of $800 per ton. This was supported by a continued favorable trend in feedstock markets. However, the margin also reflects the impact from costs related to the ramp-up of Singapore and a dilutive margin impact from higher sales from our Martinez joint operation, which together with some other factors, explain that the Q2 margin was at the low end of our guided margin range. I also want to note that during the second quarter, our focus was on ramping up our growth projects, and especially Singapore. The ramp-up progressed during the quarter, but was slowed down by the need for a shutdown for equipment repairs during June.
Oil Products had a solid comparable EBITDA of EUR 239 million. This was driven by the normalizing product margins. Marketing & Services generated a comparable EBITDA of EUR 29 million in the second quarter, following normal seasonality. Let me briefly move to safety. Safety performance continues to be a key focus area in Neste. Safety performance in the first half of 2023 continued on an improving trend compared to previous year for both occupational and process safety. We continue our focused efforts to drive a continuous improvement in our safety performance. Moving to our financial targets. Our financial position remains solid, building on the strong profitability in both renewable and Oil Products businesses. We reach a comparable after-tax ROACE of 27.4% on a rolling 12-month basis, clearly above the target level of minimum 15%.
At the end of June, our leverage ratio was 24.3%, also well within the targeted area of below 40%. A couple of comments on the business environment highlights. Firstly, as mentioned, the demand for Renewable Products remained robust, and we were able to reach a new sales record in the quarter. In parallel, waste and residue prices on average decreased versus the previous quarter. Turning then at the general Oil Products market, the main product margins were normalizing, although still at an elevated level versus the pre-pandemic period, supported seasonally by gasoline. With these remarks, I'll hand over to Martti to discuss the financials in more detail. Please, Martti.
Thank you, Matti. Let's now take a more detailed view on the financials in the second quarter and also for the first half of this year. Like Matti already mentioned, Neste posted a comparable EBITDA of EUR 784 million in the second quarter. The result is lower than the corresponding period last year at EUR 1.085 billion, but this is almost fully explained by the more normalizing margins in Oil Products. A year ago, the effects of last year's energy crisis, you could say, culminated in the second quarter for Neste. If you look at this year's second quarter result in a historical perspective, I would describe the result as a good and solid result. Our Renewable Products continued solid performance with comparable EBITDA at EUR 513 million versus EUR 538 a year earlier.
I would also like to say that our Oil Products continued to perform in a solid manner, contributing EUR 239 million of comparable EBITDA, even when comparing to the very high number at EUR 529 million a year earlier. Finally, our Marketing and Services continued its good performance with comparable EBITDA at EUR 29 million, although impacted by inventory losses in line with falling product prices compared to significant inventory gains in the second quarter last year. It is of note that our IFRS EBITDA totaled EUR 523 million the quarter. There is thus a difference of EUR 260 million to the comparable EBITDA at EUR 784 million. The main reason is that the result was impacted by inventory losses in line with decreasing commodity prices, totaling EUR 305 million.
On the other hand, the changes in the fair value of open commodity and currency derivatives were in the second quarter positive, totaling EUR 38 million, and additionally, there were other positive adjustments totaling EUR 7 million. Like I said, the comparable EBITDA is the comparable figure for you to compare our performance against previous periods. I am personally very satisfied that our cash flow before financing activities improved clearly for the first half of the year compared to last year, despite our substantial continuing growth investments and the business ramp-up in renewables. Supported by effective working capital management, our networking capital in days outstanding was 38.7 days on a rolling 12-month basis at the end of the second quarter, compared to 56.4 days a year ago. This is a clear improvement.
In the second quarter, the change in networking capital was EUR 3 million positive compared to EUR 997 million negative a year ago. Our comparable earnings per share were EUR 1.35 for the first half of the year versus EUR 1.41 a year earlier. We then, on the next slide, look at the second quarter comparison bridged by business, we can see that the comparable EBITDA decreased year-on-year, like said, is largely explained by Oil Products, which had a negative impact of EUR 291 million year-on-year. As a single item, you could also say Oil Products explains 97% of the year-on-year difference. This was a result, like I said, of the normalizing oil refining market.
In Renewable Products, in turn, our comparable EBITDA was supported by record high sales volumes, but in this quarter was affected by a slightly lower sales margin at $800 per ton compared to a year ago. As described earlier, also by Matti, RPs or Renewable Products result was affected by costs related to the ramp-up of our new line in Singapore, and a high amount of sales from the margin as joint operation, which has a lower margin in the absence of pretreatment facilities, which I expected to be available by the end of this year. In addition, the sales margin was also impacted by sales mix and certain timing differences in the revenue recognitions of biofuel tickets. However, it's good to highlight here that our Singapore ramp-up costs are one-off by nature.
When we, on the next page, look at the first half of 2023 comparison bridged by profit driver, we note that the sales volume improvement, both from Oil Products and Renewable Products, improved our result year-over-year by EUR 42 million. Margin increase, particularly in Renewable Products, had a positive impact of EUR 81 million year-on-year. As we continue to grow our global platform and capabilities, our fixed costs were still rising and had a EUR 178 million negative impact year-on-year, if you look at the first half year. Going forward, we do not expect our fixed cost to increase in the same pace, and it's good to know that the main volume increases from our new production lines are only forthcoming. Going forward, deriving further efficiency and optimization benefits will be one of our key focus areas as well.
As outlined at our CMD in June, we are, for example, continuing our Neste Excellence Program with wholly new targets. The new improvement target for the Neste Excellence Program is to create over EUR 350 million of EBIT improvements by the end of 2026, compared to the year 2022, acting as the new baseline year. The program focuses on the following four levers: digital and data-driven Neste, end-to-end process excellence, production excellence, as well as business model optimization. When we then look at our cash flow for the first half year, the first note is that the decrease in commodity prices have had a significant impact on IFRS EBITDA. Our first six months, IFRS EBITDA was EUR 986 million, EUR 677 million lower compared to the comparable EBITDA at EUR 1.66 million a year earlier.
The change in networking capital was EUR 205 million negative, but materially better compared to the EUR 2.3 billion negative change a year earlier. Net cash generated from operating activities was EUR 794 million for the first half year, clearly better than the negative EUR 385 million a year earlier. Our capital expenditure, including M&A, was EUR 945 million in the first half year, EUR 517 million higher compared to the EUR 428 million a year earlier. Cash flow before financing activities was EUR 126 million negative, but clearly better than the EUR 968 million negative a year earlier.
As a summary for cash flow, our cash flow improved clearly in the first half of the year, although being impacted by our substantial growth investments and the decrease in commodity prices. The improvement was also supported by our effective networking capital management. I will close here for my part and hand it over to Carl to go through over our renewable products business in more detail.
Thank you, Martti. This is Carl. Good morning, good afternoon to everyone. Let me take you through the renewables figures. In Renewable Products, the solid business performance continued during the second quarter of the year, and we reached a new all-time high sales volume in both RD and SAF. Our comparable EBITDA was at EUR 513 million , up almost EUR 100 million from our Q1 result, while slightly below the year back EBITDA of EUR 538 million . We also faced some delays in the Singapore expansion ramp-up, as we had some standard refinery equipment failure at the new line, which forced us to shut down the unit to make repair works during the second quarter, as well as the beginning of the third quarter.
Start by looking at the comparable sales margin, the margin remained very strong during the second quarter as we reached a margin of $800 per metric ton, while slightly below the year-back margin of $841. If you look at the key drivers for the lower margin, quarter-on-quarter, margins were partly impacted by certain timing differences in the revenue recognition of biofuel tickets, lower diesel prices, as well as some changes in the sales mix. In addition to these, the sales margin was impacted by the margin dilutive impact of the increasing Martinez volumes, as well as Singapore expansion ramp-up costs related to the equipment repairs. On the other hand, waste and residue prices reduced quarter-on-quarter, supporting margins as the share remained high in the quarter at 96%. Let's look at the volumes.
As mentioned, we reached an all-time record sales volume in the second quarter, as RD sales volume grew by more than 40%, from 638 kiloton in the first quarter to 905 kilotons in the second quarter, which also was 125 kiloton above the volume seen in Q2 last year. The sales of SAF volumes also almost doubled quarter on quarter and reached 40 kilotons in the second quarter, up from 23 kilotons in the first quarter. SAF volumes are expected to continue to further grow towards the end of the year as we continue to ramp- up Singapore production and SAF capabilities over the course of the quarter.
Sales volumes to the U.S. increased over the course of the quarter and reached 40% of the total renewable sales, up from 31% one year back, underlying the fast-growing demand seen in the region and the ramp-up of Martinez. The utilization rate of our refinery was high over the quarter, reaching 107%, up from 104% a year back, as the existing lines were operating with high availability. Investments dropped quarter-on-quarter, reaching EUR 356 million in the second quarter, down from EUR 506 million in the first quarter, up from EUR 203 million, which was reported in the second quarter, one year back.
We continue to execute our growth strategy. Our 12-month rolling comparable RONA continues to remain strong, and was 21% in the second quarter. Our CapEx expenditure will remain elevated over the year as we continue to invest in our production capabilities and product flexibilities at our production facilities in Rotterdam, Singapore, and Martinez. We also continue to execute our feedstock strategy, including potential future M&A capital expenditure. Let me take you through the EBITDA bridge between Q2 in 2022 and Q2 2023. As mentioned, sales volumes grew significantly from one year back, boosting the EBITDA by EUR 75 million. On the other hand, sales margins decreased slightly year-on-year, lowering the EBITDA for the quarter by EUR 12 million.
The weaker dollar also had a negative impact on our EBITDA, lowering it by EUR 15 million year-on-year. Our fixed cost also continued to grow year-on-year and had a negative impact on the EBITDA by EUR 73 million. The increase in fixed cost year-on-year is on the back of our business growth as we continue to scale up our business ahead of the Singapore expansion and Martinez Renewables. To summarize, year-on-year, our quarterly EBITDA ended up at EUR 538 million EBITDA, which is EUR 25 million below the Q2 EBITDA in 2022. If you turn to the feedstock, let's look at how the market developed over the quarter.
If we start with the vegetable oils, we continue to see a decline in the values over the course of the second quarter across the complex. Having said this, we have now seen over the past weeks, a steep increase in soybean oil values based on healthy supply demand in the U.S., as well as some production-related concerns. Palm has, on the other hand, remained relatively weak, although slight recovery from the low seen in Q2. There are also some concerns relating to Ukrainian exports through the Black Sea, which could potentially tighten S&D in the acts across the board. Waste and residue values followed the general trend in the vege oil complex and declined in value to a broad extent as well.
Waste and residue spreads continued to soften over the course of the quarter, although at a slower pace compared to what we saw during the first quarter. The strengthening soybean oil prices may, over the course of the coming quarter, again, strengthen the waste and residue, particularly in North American markets, as biofuel players likely will seek alternative feedstocks to increasingly expensive soybean oil. We therefore expect waste and residue markets to gain support at these levels as demand growth continues to be robust.
Let's then finally look at the U.S. credit prices on the following page. You start by looking at the LCFS prices, prices continued to slowly trend up and reached $80 per metric ton in the middle of the quarter. Towards the end of the quarter, prices eased slightly and then ended in the mid-70s, where they are remained since. On the other hand, RIN credit prices continued to slowly trend down over the course of the quarter, trading at an average of $1.51 per gallon, down from $1.60 per gallon during the previous quarter, and $1.70 per gallon in the second quarter last year.
The market, however, seems to have bottomed out here, and has now, during the start of the third quarter, started trending upwards and is trading around 160 cents per gallon currently. With strengthening soybean oil prices, there seems to be good support and potential upside in the RIN values here. This concludes the Renewables part. As will be elaborated by Matti later in this call, in the outlook section, we are expecting very strong margins also in the third quarter, with a guided range of $800 to $900 per metric ton. Sales volumes are expected to somewhat decrease quarter-on-quarter on the back of the slower than planned ramp-up in Singapore. Thanks on my behalf. Now over to Oil Products, and you, Markku.
Thanks, Carl. Good afternoon, all. A quick update from Oil Products. We had a solid quarter in a volatile refining market. The comparable EBITDA was EUR 239 million, versus EUR 529 million the year before, and EUR 393 million in Q1 this year. The performance reflects return to a more normal market conditions after quarters of tightness and high energy costs. Sales volumes was 2.8 million tons, the same level as the year before, and 0.2 million tons lower than in Q1 this year. The total refining margin was $16.7 per barrel, down from $13.3 per barrel compared to Q2 2022, and down $5.1 per barrel from the previous quarter.
Compatible return on net asset was 46.9% in Q2 for Oil Products. Over to the EBITDA bridge. The total refining margin drop of EUR 263 million was by far the largest driver of lower results compared to Q2 last year. The volume had a marginally positive impact, while both FX and fixed costs had a negative impact. On the market, you'll see a development of the main market drivers. The volatility has come down from the extremes of last year as the market returns to more normal conditions. Overall, the margins are still at a healthy level. The lower diesel margin in Q2 was driven by the weakening industrial demand outlook. However, the margin improved towards the end of the quarter.
Gasoline margins stayed above diesel through Q2, supported by the driving season and earlier refinery outages influencing storage levels. This completes the quarterly upgrade from Oil Products. Handing over to Panu for Marketing & Services.
Thank you, Markku. Hello to all, Panu Kopra speaking. Solid financial performance continued in Marketing and Services. Q2 EBITDA was EUR 29 million, which is roughly EUR 5 million better than in Q1. During last year, fuel prices were peaking up, and we gained high stock profits, and that's the main reason why EBITDA is less than last year. Our market shares in Finland has been growing very well, and operations are running normally. Aviation kerosene and Neste MY volumes increased both more than 30% year-over-year. We have opened three new EV charging stations in Finland, and we continue to invest to new EV sites during the year. Feedback from our EV customers have been very positive. This was shortly about Q2 in Marketing and Services. Handing over back to Matti.
Thank you, Panu. Let's now move on to the current topics. Let me continue with an update on our growth strategy. First of all, our short-term focus is on the ramp-up of Singapore. Ramping up such complex refinery is not a straightforward process. We are addressing all issues to ensure a safe and reliable operation, and we expect the ramp-up of the capacity to be completed by year-end. We also remain confident in our unique business model and our ability to sell our production. A very important item in the ramp-up is the startup of the SAF production in Singapore. That is now scheduled to start in the third quarter. In Martinez, we target to start up the next phases by year-end, including the pretreatment, to enable better feedstock flexibility.
Once all phases are completed, Martinez will be among the largest renewable diesel facilities in the world, with a competitive operating cost profile and good logistics and feedstock flexibility. Our Rotterdam SAF optionality project is targeted to start up in early 2024. The Rotterdam capacity growth project is progressing according to plan for startup by mid-2026. Of course, we also continue to focus on waste and residue feedstock growth, as this is an important value driver, also going forward. If I look then at our global growth and value creation, as we outlined in the capital markets day in June, we will continue to differentiate ourselves from competitors with our flexible goal, with our flexible global operating platform, and focus on feedstock growth and expansion in most attractive markets.
We remain confident that our flexible business model will deliver a source of sustainable competitive advantage, both short-term and in the future. As an outlook, we see the following: The visibility in the global economy continues to be low, and we expect volatility in Oil Products and renewable feedstock markets to continue. The Renewable Products' third quarter, Renewable Diesel and SAF sales volume, is expected to be somewhat lower than in the second quarter of 2023. The sales volume is affected by two key factors. Firstly, a planned five-week maintenance shutdown in the Singapore existing line, and secondly, the continued equipment repair works in the new line in July. The overall sales volume impact of the repair works of the new production line is expected to be 230 kilotons during the second half of the year, versus our original ambitious ramp-up plan.
We expect the ramp-up of the production of the Singapore expansion to be completed by the end of the year, and renewable sales volumes to grow after the third quarter. Based on the current outlook, Neste's third quarter comparable sales margin is expected to remain very strong and to be in the range of $800 to $900 per ton. The segment's third quarter fixed costs are expected to be approximately $15 million higher than in the second quarter. As we have communicated also earlier, we have planned maintenance shutdowns to Singapore existing line in the third quarter, with an estimated EBITDA comp impact of approximately $85 million, and in the fourth quarter, we have a scheduled four-week maintenance in the Rotterdam renewable refinery. Turning to Oil Products, the market in Oil Products is expected to remain volatile.
Based on the current forward market, the third quarter total refining margin is expected to be slightly higher than in the second quarter. The third quarter sales volumes are expected to remain high, supported by the summer driving season. In Marketing and Services, the sales volumes and unit margins are expected to follow the previous year's seasonality pattern in the third quarter. We continue to execute our strategy and invest in our business. Neste estimates the group's full year 2023 cash-out capital expenditure, excluding M&A, to be approximately EUR 1.6 billion to EUR 1.7 billion. This concludes the presentation, and we would now be happy to take your questions.
Thank you. As a reminder, to ask a question, you will need to press star one and one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. To withdraw your question, please press star one and one again. We will take our first question. The question comes from the line of Erwan Kerouredan from RBC. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hi, thanks for taking my question. I have two, please. First, on volume and the equipment failure in Singapore, and then second on the Renewable Energy Directive in Europe. On the equipment failure, can you provide some additional information? Does it relate to RD or SAF production or both? Can you give more clarity on, like, basically what happened and what, where it sits within the operations? What prompts you to ensure that it's indeed a one-off?
In terms of, like, volume expectations for 3Q, my understanding is that volumes will be down some like 10% quarter-on-quarter in 3Q as a result of this and other factors. Could you just confirm that, please? Thank you. The last question is on the revision of the Renewable Energy Directive or RED III, which is expected for September. Could this represent upside to your own demand projections for renewable fuels in Europe? These are my questions. Thank you.
Thanks, everyone. Carl here. I'll answer your first question. Indeed, this, as mentioned here, this is, we're talking about this, what we would characterize the standard refinery equipment, that we had some quality failure, and we were forced to shut down and then make the repair works. We assume that we will be able to start production again here in the beginning of August. The ramp-up will continue then as planned.
Perhaps this is Matti. I can add, it's of course, an integrated production line, that is why then when we do these kind of repairs, we take the line down during the repairs. Perhaps a quick comment, you had a question, the outlook for the third quarter. We have said that for the Renewable Products, we expect the total Renewable Diesel soft sales volume to be somewhat lower. The order of magnitude you mentioned, around 10%, sounds about right. Perhaps a short comment on the Renewable Energy Directive revision in Europe. We are also expecting, based on the information we have, that there would be a decision taken on this package in September. We are expecting, of course, that to confirm the higher ambition for greenhouse gas reductions going forward.
This is, at the same time, something that we have also had in our long-term forecasts. Of course, one interesting one is to follow how different member states actually transpose the new legislation, and in a way, depending on how quickly they adopt it, this could then present also some upside once we see then the actual member state roadmaps to reach that high ambition. I hope this answers your question. Martti, please.
Martti is still here. like Carl said here, standard equipment, there were some questions earlier during today whether this relates to pre-treatment facilities. It does not, but just standard, standard equipment that we are able to replace rather in a standard order.
Thank you, thank you. That's extremely helpful. Just to confirm, you confirm it affects both RD and SAF, right? Not just one single product. Thank you.
Yes, indeed. This affects the full new line in Singapore. The whole line was taken down in order to make these repair works.
Understood. Thank you so much. It's very helpful.
Sorry, Erwan, this is Matti. One short correction to my earlier comment on your RED question and our long-term forecast. We have not fully modeled the RED III, so there is actually some upside when we now get the confirmation ultimately. Correcting my earlier answer here.
Thank you. That's very helpful. Thank you.
Thank you. We will take our next question. The next question comes from the line of Henri Patricot from UBS. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Yes, everyone, thank you for the update. Two questions, please. The first one, I wanted to ask you, looking at the margin guidance for the third quarter, what you include in that, in terms of both any remaining impact from the Singapore repairs. You also mentioned for the second quarter, there was this timing recognition of uprate. Is that a tailwind in the third quarter that you included in the guidance? Any detail you can give on that would be helpful. Secondly, again, a bit further out to 2024, I was wondering if you can give us some more comments about your views on margins are developing, consciously still maybe a little bit early, but any additional comments you'd like to make compared since the last month? Thank you.
Thanks, Henri. Carl here. First, answering your first question. Indeed, I mean, our guidance for the third quarter is taking into account that we had this kind of one-time, one-off events during the second quarter here, mainly related exactly to what you referred to, to the recognition of the biofuel tickets, as well as this repair impact from the repair works at the Singapore refinery. These are then expected to have a kind of positive impact quarter on quarter towards the third quarter. Thank you.
I'll take the next question, Henri, this was on 2024, and I think perhaps reiterating first the key messages we also gave at our CMD. We are, first of all, very confident in our flexible business model, that it continues to create value. We see the value coming from our feedstock capabilities. We see the value coming from our market optionality and growing in the most attractive markets, also expecting to grow in the SAF market. Of course, in general, having this very flexible business platform, that it enables us to adapt to the market situation. We also discussed during the CMD that we do expect to see more supply coming on stream, so this can, of course, create some pressure compared to the very high margins we have seen in 2023.
We are confident that we are able to sell our production and to reach attractive margins. Perhaps it's, in a way, a good starting point to not only look at 2023, but just to also look at some of the previous years if you make different scenarios for next year.
This is Martti. I might add here that these problems or challenges that we have now in the Singapore ramp up, at present, we don't see that they have any effect on our sales volumes next year. That's very important. Like we are stating, that we still forecast to be growing our sales volumes again in the fourth quarter onwards.
Understood. Thank you.
Thank you. We will take our next question. The next question comes from the line of Giacomo Romeo from Jefferies. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Yes. Thank you. Just a couple of questions. First, with regards to what you flagged about the one-offs that impacted your results in the first quarter. Are you able to provide a little bit of quantify the impact from these biofuel tickets and perhaps also on the, what was the impact of the dilutive dilution of margin from Martinez? It would be good to put some numbers on that. Then with regards to SAF, just trying to see, to try to understand how as the new capacity come on, how quickly will you be able to ramp up your sales volumes?
How good is your visibility onto the your sale or your SAF sales, say, into the first part of 2024, I mean? T o what extent you have already sold these on term volumes. If you can get a little bit more color on that, would be helpful as well.
Yep. Thank you for the questions. This is Martti. Perhaps first answering on the first one. obviously, like, Carl explained earlier, there were some items in the second quarter, both related to the costs related to the repairs we had to make, but also then some of these timing issues related to the tickets. If I look at these kind of type of costs, without them, we would probably have been very comfortably in our guidance range, let's say more, more towards the middle of that one. Of course, commenting on Martinez, this is of course something we have also clearly stated earlier, that in this first phase, without the feed pretreatment, the margin level is lower. I think there's actually some quite interesting reference data you can actually see publicly.
If you look, for example, in the U.S., at Argus stat, you can see the difference, for example, in the reference margin for soybean-based, oil-based, renewable diesel and then some waste and residue-based diesel. This is quite significant. Of course, we are looking forward to starting up the pretreatment unit and use that flexibility going forward.
Oh, sorry. There was. Sub volume.
There was a second question. How quickly and visibility. Yeah, exactly.
Mm.
Well, I mean, from our perspective, the key focus at the moment is now, as stated earlier, to ramp- up the capacity in Singapore to reach the full capacity end of the year and to start up the SAF production in the third quarter. Obviously, then, we will be increasing our sales volumes as production increases. Looking at next year, we don't have an exact volume, but we would expect, of course, the demand to clearly grow versus this year. To be able to basically sell several multiples of this year's sales next year.
Thank you.
Thank you. We will take our next question. Your next question comes from the line of Artem Beletski from SEB. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Yes. Hi, and thank thank you for taking my questions. Firstly, I would like to come back to your commentary relating to 2024 margins in renewables, and you were commenting about those being attractive and making reference to previous years. What, would it basically means that you're talking about margins levels which are should be roughly $700 to $800 per ton? Just an additional question on that. Then looking at the Martinez pretreatment ramp up, could you be more detailed on timing of it happening? Should we see some benefits already in Q3 of this year? Because I guess it will have quite meaningful impact on the unit profitability.
The last one is actually to Martti, what comes to renewables depreciation. It increased quite significantly in Q2. I think it was something like EUR 30 million quarter-on-quarter. Could you comment what should be the run rate for upcoming quarters? Thank you.
Thank you, Artem, for the question. This is Martti first. Mainly what I meant with my comments on 2024 is that if making scenarios for next year, then just making that observation, not only look at 2023, but look at actual sales margins that we have had in the last few years before 2023. You will find those numbers. We have had a range of margins in that region. Obviously, we are confident that we will do everything to maximize the margin with our business model.
Artem, Carl here. Thanks for the question on the Martinez PTU. As also communicated during the CMD, we have been starting off that unit at the end of Q2, and we are currently ramping it up and testing it. We do not see that it will have a significant impact on our margins still here in the third quarter, as we still are now learning how to operate that unit and optimize it. It will definitely be a very important value driver for the Martinez Refinery going forward to enable a much more wider feedstock base.
I think we will see that the impact of this will be strongly, more strongly visible, let's say, towards the end of the year, early next year.
This is Martti on the depreciation. Now in the early part of this year, we have taken the Singapore new production line into a proper plant and equipment, and of course, the first phase of the Martinez, and they were reflected. I'm looking now at the total group level depreciation at EUR 212 million versus year-over-year EUR 158 million, a clear growth also from the first quarter. This is quite reflective estimate for the third and fourth quarter. However, there might come some more, depending on how, when we are starting with the Phase 3 in Martinez. Depending on that, do we start depreciating from the first month of next year or early part of next year or very late of this year?
You could assume that most likely from the beginning of next year.
Okay, thank you. This is very helpful.
Thank you. We will take our next question. The next question comes from the line of Peter Low from Redburn. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hi, thanks. I just wanted to make sure I fully understood the phasing of the Martinez volumes. My understanding is that the first phase is 0.5 million tons gross, and that is, I think, now operating fully, but if you could confirm that, that would be great. You then, I think, have the nameplate expansion, which you call Phase C, that will take total gross capacity to 2.1 million tons. You're saying that that will be available by year-end. Will there be a ramp-up period, or will that kind of be able to be fully utilized once it starts up at the end of this year? Thanks.
Thanks, Peter, for that question. Carl here. Indeed, the plan is in the phase 3 to take the full capacity on stream, and the startup is planned to be in the third, towards the end of the third, fourth quarter this year. However, we will clearly also see a ramp-up, and we expect the capacity to be on stream in the beginning of next year. There will be a ramp-up period, and we will see then the capacity coming on stream in the first part of the year.
So I can kind of clarify, it'll be ramping up towards the end of this year rather than in the first part of next? Thanks.
The start up is planned for the end of this year. The ramp up will happen. We expect it to happen in the start of the new year.
Thank you.
Thank you. We will take our next question. Your next question comes from the line of Sasikanth Chilukuru from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hi, thanks for taking my questions. First, I just wanted to understand more on the repair work on the new production line. I just wanted to confirm whether it's correct to assume that there is no production from this production line in July. Also, any clarity on what the impact sales volumes was in the second quarter specifically related to that would be helpful. Finally, related to this, I was just wondering if there was any insurance associated with the loss of sales volumes due to the equipment failure. The second question I had was on the position of the extraordinary dividend. Just wondering when that would be confirmed and paid as well, the EUR 0.25 per share.
Thank you, Sasikanth. This is Matti. Perhaps I can briefly comment. Like we said in our outlook, we expected the repair works in the new line to continue in July. We are now quite at the end of July, so it is in these coming days that we expect to be starting up. That is where we are on that one. We haven't actually quantified the exact volumes. I mean, we mentioned in our report that in June we had that maintenances, and now it continued in July. You see the overall impact of these two versus our ambitious plan, that was the 230,000 tons that was mentioned.
On the insurance, I would just say it's obviously a routine thing, that we will be looking at the possibility whether we can make any claims, but that is still something that is pending.
Perhaps if I add still to your question around Q2 volumes, this didn't have any impact on our Q2 sales volumes, actually. The impact is seen in the second half.
Marty, maybe on the extraordinary dividend, so it is for the sole discretion for the board to decide on that. Maybe if we think, look from the management point of view, we don't see currently such developments in our external environment that could not be paid. Like I said, it's for the board to decide.
Great. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Once again, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one and one on your telephone. We will take our next question. The question comes from the line of Iiris Theman from Carnegie. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Good afternoon, thanks for taking my questions. I have three questions, please. Firstly, can you comment anything about your SAF sales margin expectation? Do you expect somewhat higher margins than in Renewable Diesel, perhaps some $200 per ton? Secondly, looking at the Q4 fixed cost expectation, should we assume basically flat growth or flat costs in Q4 compared to Q3, or should we assume already some cost decreases in Q4? Thirdly, how do you see the current demand outlook for Renewable Diesel and SAF? Besides RED III, are there going to be any other regulation changes in the next six to 12 months? Thanks.
Thank you, Iiris. Perhaps I can take the first question. This is Matti on the SAF sales margin. Obviously, we see this as a very important market, and good demand for SAF solutions, we do expect the margin level to be competitive also versus Renewable Diesel. We haven't quantified it, but of course, what you can see, we, for example, have made quite a big investment in SAF optionality. I take the example of the Rotterdam project, the decision we took. As you know, we have our return targets, the minimum of the 15% ROACE target also for our entire portfolio. It also shows that, of course, we expect that value to be there so that we can make a good investment out of this.
Always something when the sales have actually been going up, that we can come back to.
This is Martti, on the fixed cost. Thanks for the question, Iiris. We've been in the first half of this year on the high side in the fixed cost increase. If I look for the group, EUR 90 million year-on-year in the second quarter, EUR 178 million for the first half of the year. 80% roughly of that has come from the RP side, 79% to be precise for the full year, first half, and 81% for the second quarter. However, the guidance for RP is now only about EUR 50 million higher for the third quarter versus the second. Really waning down the growth rate. It's only about 20% of the growth in the second quarter compared to that.
That quite well reflects where we are heading towards. Slightly early to say precisely on the fourth quarter, we may be see some minor increase, but really, our fixed cost growth, we expect to be coming down year-on-year. We will be starting to look really towards those efficiencies and optimization, like I mentioned earlier, going forward, and particularly then of course, next year, and of course, waiting to get the ramp up our all the sales volumes that we are now ramping up to get those benefits out.
Iiris, hi, Iiris, Carl here. On the demand side, we have seen that the market has remained with healthy demand. As you saw in the second quarter, we had a record sales volumes in RD and SAF, and we see that still continues during the year here. Going forward, we see that there will also be a growth into 2024. We estimate it to be around 2 million tons of demand growth year-on-year. At the same time, we are also seeing a number of new markets being developed.
There is also potential upside for the further RD demand as well as voluntary SAF demand in that on top of this.
Besides the RED III, are there going to be any other regulation changes?
Well, I would say that as Martti commented earlier, I think that the main focus in Europe will be after the RED negotiations are completed, we will see how the transposition into the different member states then goes. I think that this will be, of course, a very interesting part then of how this market develops, particularly in Europe. As alluded to, I mean, we do see movement in other parts of the world as well. In Asia Pacific, we're seeing some further talks in Japan, for instance.
We believe that the markets might also further grow in the U.S., over the course of the coming years. There is definitely upside potential there, then in addition to the voluntary demand, I think.
This is Martti. I add here a small anecdote, but at present, of course, during the hot summer months, we are seeing several of the islands and half of, you know, several parts in Southern Europe seemingly on fire. These types of weather conditions and changes, we expect them to bring the decarbonization agenda strongly back to the table.
Thank you.
Thank you. We will take our next question. The next question comes from the line of Matthew Blair from TPH. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hey, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions. Circling back to the SAF uplift question, we're seeing some data that shows European SAF premiums in the $500 to $600 per ton range. Is that what you're seeing as well? As we try to calculate this SAF uplift, is there anything else that we need to consider? You know, for example, is there a worse yield when you produce SAF relative to RD? Second question is, is there any update on the new dividend approach? In particular, have you developed your list of competitors that you'll comp to when thinking about the new dividend strategy? Third, could you talk about the impacts to your business in 2025 in the U.S. when the BTC converts to the PTC?
Does that limit the ability of Singapore to send RD into the California market, and does that also reduce the margin outlook for Martinez? Thank you.
Thank you, Matthew. This is first Martti. If I start with the SAF premium question. Well, I actually earlier commented on it.
in a way, we are not giving at the moment this exact pricing data or anything. I refer to the earlier comment I made, that of course, we have made an investment. We have invested in this optionality, 500 kilotons in Rotterdam with a substantial CapEx, and we do see that the margin will be competitive. Of course, it's then a combination of the premium and all the costs related to the whole supply chain, how it exactly works in the production. The overall, we expect that it's a good investment, bringing those returns. Pass Martti, do you want to comment on the dividend question?
Yes, thank you for the question. I'm honest there, that during the summer here, we haven't and our board hasn't delved into that. That will be on the agenda sometime towards the end of the year. Like communicated at the CMD, we will look at benchmarks, probably from a couple of industry. Of course, if there are any direct peers, definitely on those, that will be high on the agenda. Also at Specialty Chemicals group was mentioned, not too much on the more traditional oil and gas, but perhaps also a little bit towards that. Of course, Neste in its transformation is very far. We think we are not a traditional oil and gas play anymore, so that was also mentioned at the CMD.
I would like to, yeah, continue that very clear target with the dividend policy is to continue paying a competitive and a growing dividend. The, the change was merely made to give us a little bit more of flexibility, if the board would so wish, when it thinking of the yearly payments or, or anything, compared to our growth agenda and opportunities on that side. It's definitely in our target, that to be also a good dividend payer going forward.
There was the third question on 2025, and perhaps briefly commenting, I mean, what we have seen in this IRA proposal is indeed a switch of the blender's tax credit to a producer's tax credit. We are also waiting still for the exact criteria, but our expectation is, of course, that we are very well positioned with our share in the Martinez joint operation. In a way, while you are right that it's probably not exactly the same as the BTC, we see that from a relative competitiveness, this is what matters, so I don't see an immediate impact for Martinez. For Singapore or any other imports, it's of course still then something to see what are the exact criteria, is there any mechanisms that imports can also benefit from in terms of credits?
This is then something we need to analyze once the full guidelines are available.
Great. Thanks for your comments.
Thank you. We will take our next question. Your next question comes from the line of Matthew Lofting from J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hi. Thanks for taking the questions. Two, if I could, please. First, I just wanted to come back to your operational outlook for the business in, in renewables beyond the second half of this year, 2024 plus. Could you just reiterate the view there and the outlook from the beginning of next year, and the extent to which, from an operational performance and asset utilization perspective, you believe and have confidence that the utilization rates and sales volumes of the business are intact relative to where you saw them, say, three to six months ago? The extent to which there's any deterioration in that view as a consequence of the outages you've experienced at Singapore through the last couple of months.
Secondly, just to come back to the, sort of the earlier point on insurance related to the outlook, given that it appears that it's related to standard refining kit as opposed to something more specialized. I would assume that some form of insurance coverage would be industry standard. Is there any reason why that wouldn't be the case in this instance? Thank you.
Thanks, Matt. Carl here. I'll take your first questions on our business outlook for 2024. As communicated, it is clear that these markets continue to grow at a fast pace, but we also see increasing competition over the course of the coming years. Having said that, we do believe that we are very well positioned to be very competitive in this environment as well. We are serving more than 30 markets today, and we have been in this market for a very long time already, and we have very strong relationship with our key customers.
In addition to that, we of course, have been building our feedstock capabilities, building upstream capabilities when it comes to also feedstock production and collection. We believe that this will be important element as well in remaining competitive. Then, of course, very importantly as well, the capabilities that we have within our refineries, our pre-treatment capabilities and with Singapore now as well, we are again enhancing these capabilities to have a much wider feedstock pool. All of these elements together form a very important.
Important system or model how we are, we'll be able to remain very competitive in these markets. We believe that we will be able to run at high utilization, and we will have markets to sell the volumes that we are producing over the course of the coming years.
If I may add, I think you were specifically asking, referring to the repairs we have now done. I think to be very clear, we do expect to fix those issues now. It is our target then to continue to ramp up, to reach full capacity end of the year. This is not something that would affect next year. Also, like Carl also said, we remain very confident in our business model that we are able to sell all production.
This is Martti. I also continue to say what we also said at the CMD, that the overall market for diesel and SAF, it's a fragmented market between different geographies. Europe is very different from the U.S., and when we go into polymers and chemicals, Asia, et cetera. It's not a single homogeneous commodity market by any sense. That's very good to remember. Back to your insurance question, I'm sorry we didn't answer that perhaps before. We have, at Neste, a very wide insurance coverage, and here we are of course, talking about business interruption insurance, which we also have.
We are currently investigating into that, whether we can get compensated, and it will be dependent on, of course, on the own liability that you take and the length of that, compared to the. Some of the more detailed questions when it comes to the causes. But we are currently looking at that, but at the outset, we have a very wide coverage.
Thank you. Thank you. We will take our next question. The next question comes from the line of Naisheng Cui from Barclays. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hi, good afternoon. Thanks for taking my questions. I have two, if that's okay. The first one is just trying to get some clarification on the equipment issue in Singapore. Shall I assume that the volume impacted 230,000 tons to be front-loaded to Q3 rather than Q4? Shall I assume sort of 230,000 tons being equally distributed for Q3 and Q4? I just wonder, were you aware of this situation during the CMD last month? If yes, what has changed? My second question is, I think, Martti, you mentioned earlier during the Q&A that you are very confident that there's no volume impact despite the Swedish mandate cut for next year. Just wondered, will you guys have any plan to give a detailed explanation on how you address the Swedish mandate cut sometime this year? Thank you.
Carl here. I'll try to answer your first question here. Looking at the volume impact as communicated, we see it being at the second half. However, we can probably assume that there is a bigger share of that impacting the Q2 volumes, actually.
Q3.
Q, sorry, Q3. Q3 volumes, actually. of course, there's a long supply chain from Singapore to the markets, but this is roughly how it. That's a correct assumption. We were not aware of these problems during the CMD, and hence we were not communicating about these either. These have occurred following the CMD.
This is Matti. I will add a comment on the third question on Sweden. I think what we have said is that we are indeed confident in our business model so that we can reallocate volumes. Of course, we are now in the period where we will be starting based on all the preparations we have done to work on our term contracts for next year. I think what we can say is that we have now analyzed the reallocation need that we see coming from this regulatory change. We do expect that to be in the order of magnitude of 500,000 ton. That is sort of what we are talking about, but as we are active in many markets, this is then of course, what we are now working on to reallocate this.
Martti here, also confirming what Matti was saying. Approximately 500 kilotons, we have estimated the relocation need, but we expect to be able to sell that, during next year.
Perfect.
Relocate, to other markets, like many times highlighted.
Perfect. Thank you very much.
Thank you. We will take our next question. Your next question comes from the line of Christopher Kuplent from Bank of America. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Thank you very much. I've got a few more questions, please, if I may. Just maybe on the last comment you gave us regarding the $500,000, that's interesting detail. Any view on the extra cost of rerouting that would be great for us to get a feeling on your margin outlook on a sort of normal ongoing basis? As far as that margin is concerned, my next question is regarding still the second half of this year. I think if I understood you earlier, and please confirm, that Q2 would've been somewhere closer to $850 per ton without those issues in Singapore.
I just wonder why your guidance for Q3 isn't EUR 800, considering that those issues have persisted throughout July, i.e., another month, just like you've experienced in Q2 in June? Any additional detail around that would be helpful. Perhaps this has got a lot to do with how you've managed your inventories as well. If you could shed light on that, that would be great. Lastly, could you specify when you are going to take that five-week planned shutdown in Singapore? I'm not sure whether I missed the timing, how it's going to straddle Q3 and Q4 in the second half. Thank you.
Thank you. This is Matti. Perhaps I start with a follow-up question on Sweden. Obviously, like I mentioned, we are now in the period where we are with all the good preparations we have done, starting our term negotiations. We are, of course, looking at different opportunities to reallocate this. Obviously, the question was asked earlier, we are working hard to grow our SAF capabilities and to grow that sales next year, and we have a number of other markets that we are working on. Of course, this is then the outcome of the term negotiation, so I don't have at the moment a comment on the exact margin impact.
In the second quarter, perhaps the second question, I wanna just correct the comment I made earlier, because what I said is that there were actually a number of one-off things in the second quarter. It was some costs related to the repairs, but also, for example, the timing issues on these biofuel tickets, that was an overall comment that without these type of things which were specific to the second quarter, we would have expected to be somewhere in that middle of the range.
Okay.
Then perhaps on the timing of the shutdown, Carl, do you wanna take that?
Yes. The, as communicated, sort of Singapore, planned five-week shutdown is now occurring during the third quarter. Typically, I mean, it has an impact on that quarter, obviously, but we are also typically balancing the volumes a bit further out. It is all impacting also certain volumes in Q4. The actual shutdown takes place now in the third quarter.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. We will take our next question. Your next question comes from the line of Alastair Syme from Citigroup. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Yeah, thanks. Look, I just really had one question. It's back to your sort of forward guidance on Renewable Products sales margins. You know, I think you made in your comment, you said, "Look, look at history." You know, I would sort of observe 2019 to 2021, you were sort of averaging a bit over $700 a ton. Last six quarters, you've averaged over $800 a ton. You know, I guess the question to you is, is the elevation we've seen in the last few quarters, in your view, around, you know, the elevation of diesel prices across, you know, global markets because of the war, or is it something structural in the nature of the renewable fuel markets or the mix effect that you think is driving the shifts higher? Thank you.
Thank you. Perhaps a short comment. I mean, my comment earlier was looking at all the different things, we are very confident in our business model, but we also look, of course, at the changes in the market environment. My main comment was that, if working on scenarios, it's also good not only to look at the 2023 with this very high margin level, but also to look at the previous few years. We don't have a margin guidance at this moment. The main point was to show that volatility that we have seen in the past few years before that.
Okay, but do you think, you know, what do you think the driver has been of the last six quarters, of, sort of this elevated margin level? Do you think it's something to do with your business, or is it external market conditions?
Carl here. Perhaps if I try to a little bit bring some light. I think if you look at the current market environment, it has been a very rather tight supply-demand balance and rather strong premiums for Renewable Diesel. At the same time, we've also seen the feedstock markets coming off over the course of the last, say, 12 months or so, supporting margins. Going forward now, we see margins stabilizing again towards kind of the level seen perhaps in the previous-
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. We will take our next question. Your next question comes from the line of Paul Redman from BNP Paribas. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hi, guys, thank you for your time. Just to kind of come back onto 2024, when you talk about looking back at the margins, in history, if I use, say, EUR 700 to EUR 800 as kind of looking backwards, when you talk about forward looking, are you including sustainable aviation fuel in that look back at previous history? Or are you saying that Renewable Diesel might be at those margins, and then we need to work out beyond that sustainable aviation fuel price, and add that on top? When can we maybe get some comfort on maybe 2024? You're going out to term agreements, it sounds like earlier than in the past.
Does that mean that by the time you do your maybe 3Q results in October, we could start talking then about what you're seeing in terms of margins for 2024? Secondly, just a quick one. In terms of inventory write-downs this quarter, I'm just trying to think of, is that on the feedstock side, or is that on the refined product side? If it's on the renewable diesel side, how do you price those inventories? Thank you very much.
Thanks, Paul. If I take the first question, I think we are following our normal term negotiation process, so it will happen during the second half of the year. That's, that's sort of the timing. Of course, in general, when we look at the margin, we take our entire business model. That includes our strengths on the feedstock, but it also takes into account our optionality on the project. These are exactly the drivers that we can create value from. For us, it's the overall sales margin that we are always optimizing. This is, this is the approach. That's on the inventories, Martti.
And on the fine-tune production. We basically have written in the second quarter figures of our total fine-tune production from the new production line in Singapore, after we found out at the very end of the quarter or in the very end late, that it was off spec. And then the repairs started, and they have continued now in July.
Thanks. Just quickly to confirm, you're saying that if I look back at history, that would include sustainable aviation fuel when we talk about margins of the past?
Yes, we are reporting.
Yes
Total comparable sales margin, which includes also SAF, Renewable Diesel, and some other products, our Renewable Naphtha, and bio-propane, and all of those are in the single margin.
Okay, thank you very much.
For some, sometime later, if we would have a very large chunk of to be considered, where we would provide them separately, but it's not foreseeable, at least in 2024.
Thank you.
Thank you. We will take our next question. Your next question comes from the line of Henry Tarr from Berenberg. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hi, and thanks for taking my questions. The first one is probably just on the fixed costs, which sort of continue to rise. It depends how far back I look, but they're almost sort of growing faster than capacity. Has there been any change to the sort of measurement of fixed costs versus your sort of sales margin here, or is it constant? You know, I know you have the new capacity coming in, but is there anything else sort of going on here with the fixed costs? I guess that's the first question.
Martti here answering. There is maybe some elements. One is that as we are doing our investment projects, we have this unit called engineering services, where those people are very much involved at our investment projects, and now there have been a little bit of shift in some of the projects with a couple of months. We have activated a bit less than we thought, because then we are also activating those works as if they are directly linked to the project work. A little bit shows it in the overall rise of the fixed costs. There are other major elements. From the start of this year, we have Martinez Renewables for joint operation, which has a big impact.
There is also a big impact from the fact that those feedstock companies that we have acquired, we acquired SeQuential, which was closed in January. They are quite fixed cost heavy compared to traditional refining, and over the past years, we've been adding also smaller acquisitions, for instance, into a Mahoney backbone. That has a major impact. They have higher IT costs. We are completing one very important part of our last piece of our ERP backbone implementation and investing into data-driven. We have sort of been also a little bit front-loaded with some of the investments, where we expect the real benefits to come later.
The main point is that our main volumes are not foreseeable, of course, in this quarter, when we come towards the end of this year and the beginning of next year, with our nameplate capacities that have been announced earlier, hopefully at 5.5 million in the early part of next year.
Okay. Some of the feedstock gathering and vertical integration is going to add to your fixed costs a little bit, but that will also potentially boost the margin.
Yeah, and.
Right. Okay
Margins that we are getting from the feedstock companies is also embedded into the overall sales margin. The margin is there, but the cost structure is different compared to the refining business.
Yeah. Okay. Okay, then, I, I guess a second question, just hopefully an easy one. Have you given an indication on Martinez volumes in the quarter? I, I guess I can back it out just by looking at the increase in sales to the U.S. Would that give me a sensible answer?
The volumes now from Martinez, they are, they have been slightly growing, month-on-month, and they will remain stable over the course towards the, let's say, fourth quarter, when we then have the ramp up of the third phase of the.
Okay.
Of the refinery.
Okay, that's great. I guess Sorry, to keep coming back to the sort of comments on the 2024 margin. Are some of those comments based on what you're seeing for early indications in the sales negotiations? Or is it just a feeling that higher competition, slightly lower diesel prices probably mean we're gonna see a normalization, or are you already sort of seeing evidence of that at this moment, as you go through the early stages of the negotiations?
This is Matti. We are only starting the term negotiations. It's not yet based on that feedback. It was more a comment to look at it more broadly, looking at the volatility in previous years. Of course, at the same time, bringing all the strengths from our business model into it.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you. As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press star one and one on your telephone. We will take our next question. The question comes from the line of Anish Kapadia from Palissy Advisors. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Good afternoon. A couple of questions from me, please. Firstly, on the refining business, one thing of note is that heavy fuel oil margins have narrowed in, so the discount to Brent has reduced. Therefore, the spread between heavy fuel oil and diesel has narrowed in which, you know, I think is a big component of your earnings and profitability. Can you just talk a bit, you know, we've seen the kind of the challenges diesel have had. Can you talk a bit about the that heavy fuel oil margin narrowing in, is and what the trends are you're seeing there?
Then going to the Renewable business, following on from the Martinez acquisition, it seems like you were able to acquire, get into that asset at a low valuation relative where you're trading. Are you seeing similar deals to that out there? I know there's a lot of companies building Renewable Diesel plants or have got them in the pipeline. You know, are you seeing many more opportunities out there in the market at attractive pricing? Thank you.
Okay, thanks for the question on heavy fuel oil. Indeed, as you can see from the graph that I was also showing, we now reached the level of as high as it has been since 2021. We believe that the big driver here is that the supply of heavy crudes and sour crudes is down as a result of the OPEC+ regulation of the market. That has led into a supply shortage while the demand has stayed on high levels. That has driven the cracks up on that particular product. This is Matti, perhaps on the second question, I think I would start with a comment. As you are aware, I'm sure, we have a number of growth projects in execution.
We talked extensively about Singapore and Martinez here in this call. We have also ongoing our Rotterdam capacity growth expansion, aiming at 2026. We have a very clear growth path, and at the same time, we're continuously looking for opportunities in the feedstock space, as we see this as an important part of our area. Of course, we continue always looking at different type of opportunities, also longer term, whether it is then around HVO, or whether it's some of the new technologies. This is part of the normal development work we are doing.
Thank you.
I think the question was also on the valuation, and have we seen similar of those ones in the market? We can say from our part, we are very happy with the deal, and we still think it will be a world-class facility when it's up and running. The 2.1 million tons translate in the U.S., about 730 million gallons per year. There are several advantages with the site in the logistics, in the sort of capital intensity in favor of a very large asset. We are very interested looking forward. There have been some deals out in the market, but not in this scale, large scale deals, at least.
Thank you. We will take our next question. Your next question comes from the line of Pasi Väisänen from Nordea. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Great, thanks. This is Pasi from Nordea. If I may check some numbers here. If you truly lost EUR 90 million due to these problems in Singapore in the second quarter, that is about $100 per sales ton in the quarter. Were you still saying that the effect was only $50 per ton in the second quarter, not $100? Which number is right? Second, regarding the sales volumes in the third quarter, were you saying that the volumes, sales volumes could be roughly 10% under the second quarter in the third quarter? Did I hear it right?
Maybe lastly, I would like to ask that why you are using an three year, two, three, four year old margins to guide the soft volumes in the future? What is the logic to use a kind of old business model to forecast the new business model's profitability here? I didn't practically get it. Thanks.
Thank you, Pasi. I can perhaps take the question. I'll first take the second one you had. There was the question earlier, whether what we mean by somewhat lower, whether the order of magnitude of 10% is correct, and based on the current expectation, I commented this is the correct order of magnitude, at least. On the first question, I repeat what I said earlier, when we were commenting about the one-off impacts, it is some things which are related to the repairs we had to do in Singapore, but it's also these timing issues related to the biofuel tickets. The combined impact of these type of events, which we would not expect to recur, would have taken us somewhere in the middle of that range. That's on the first question.
On the third one, like I said, we are early on the SAF premiums. We are not giving, at the moment, any exact SAF margins. It was more an example to give you, in a way, the confidence that these are competitive. That is why we have made those investments, why we continue to see it as a good investment. You can from that, get some feeling for the type of value we see in the SAF.
Yeah, I hear you. By assuming that the soft margins are actually better than in the road traffic, then actually, that means that the decline in the road traffic could be kind of, reasonable and notable, even on the margins, if the combination is still kind of, between the EUR 700 and EUR 800 in the future.
It is for us, the combined margin we are always optimizing. It is, as you know, our flexible business model, this is the strength, it's the overall margin we are optimizing. We will then see next year what it exactly is. We will obviously do everything to maximize the margin.
Okay, great. I hear you. Thanks. That was all.
Thank you. There seems to be no further questions. I would like to hand back for closing remarks.
Thank you. Thank you for your excellent questions, and I would like to complete by saying that as we have discussed, Neste's growth project ramp up has started. We are highly focused on the execution of the Singapore ramp-up to reach full capacity by the end of the year, and the next phases of our Martinez growth project by year-end. As also discussed, we are confident that our unique business model will continue to create sustainable competitive advantage, both short-term and long-term. Thank you very much, and stay safe.
This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.