Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. I'm Poppy, your conference call operator. Welcome, and thank you for joining the Tüpraş Conference Call and Live Webcast to present and discuss the first quarter 2024 financial results. At this time, I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Doğan Korkmaz, CFO, and Mr. Levent Bayar, Head of Investor Relations. Mr. Bayar, you may now proceed.
Thank you. Hi, everyone. Good evening to all from Tüpraş headquarters in Istanbul, and welcome to our teleconference. I am Levent Bayar, Head of Investor Relations. I'm here with Doğan Korkmaz, CFO, and team members from Tüpraş Investor Relations and Reporting Department. Over the next hour, we will first go over our operational and financial results for the first quarter of 2024, then we will continue with the Q&A session. I'll draw your attention to our cautionary statement here. During today's presentation, we will make forward-looking statements that refer to our customers, plans, and expectations. Actual results and outcomes could differ materially. Please refer to our financial reports and material disclosures for more details. These documents are available on our website. In the next two slides, we will provide you with a brief summary of the key highlights regarding the first quarter of 2024.
Then, we will go into detail for each subject on the following slides. Now, let's take a look at Tüpraş highlights in detail for the first quarter of 2024. As you will see from the top left chart, even though crack margins aren't quite matching the peaks we saw in the last two years, they maintain a strong hold above the five-year average. On the differentials, the spread is notably wider than looking at the last quarter's figures. Despite this expansion, it is imperative to point out that these numbers have not reached the levels seen in the first quarter of the previous year. As a result, Tüpraş realized average crack margin has been realized at $14.5 per barrel for the first quarter of 2024, which is parallel to our guidance.
Let's now turn our focus to the graph situated on the right-hand side, which provides us with a visual representation of the evolution of our cash position throughout the first quarter. We diligently monitor and maintain our cash position during the first quarter of this year. Our resilient EBITDA generation and interest gains have effectively countered the impacts of rising working capital requirements. The geopolitical issues in the Red Sea has led to extended cargo durations, which in turn have caused our inventory levels to increase. In early April, we have distributed a significant TRY 20 billion of dividend from 2023 earnings. As you all know, we have introduced our strategic transition plan in November 2021. Within our vision to lead the aviation fuel transition in Turkey, we have taken a major step in our drive to produce sustainable aviation fuel.
We signed a long-term procurement agreement with Tiryaki Agro that secured a steady stream of second-generation feedstock for our SAF production. Locking in this supply is critical, given that the availability of feedstock is one of the most pressing concerns in the sustainable aviation fuel industry. Starting from 2025, our trading arm, Tüpraş Trading in the U.K., will begin feedstock trading activities. Upon the completion of sustainable aviation fuel production facility, we secure a minimum of 300,000 tons of feedstock for a duration of 10 years. As you all know, we cover this section in two main components, as developments in the global oil market and developments in the Turkish market. Let's start with the global oil market. The year started with Red Sea tensions that resulted in the rerouting of cargos and traveling all the way down to Cape of Good Hope.
The extension of the cargo duration created decreasing inventory levels in Europe, creating a pressure on the supply side and elevated Brent price. The situation in the affected region showed signs of de-escalation with the prospect of a temporary ceasefire. However, the brief break in the tension didn't last long. As global tensions increased and OPEC members continued to cut oil production, the average monthly prices for Brent crude went up. The geopolitical risk premium further escalated following drone assaults on Russian refineries, with the attacks impacting approximately 700,000 barrels per day. These incidents have underscored the tightening of global oil supplies. In terms of refinery operations, both worldwide and European refinery capacities are maintaining utilization rates that fall short of the preceding year's figures, highlighting ongoing restrictions on the supply side. Nevertheless, the global demand for oil products remains solid.
Tüpraş capacity utilization rate is positively diverging from the general trend due to the fact that we have completed major maintenances in 2023. Now, taking a look at the bottom row, Turkish market. Over the last 12 months, we have seen a significant rise in inflation, reaching close to 70% by the end of April, accompanied by a 66% devaluation in the currency compared to the previous year. In response, Central Bank has significantly increased interest rates, which is now standing at 50%, up from 9% one year earlier. Despite these measures, inflation and currency depreciation continue to advance in tandem with interest rates, making an effort to keep pace. On the demand side, Turkish demand for oil products remained resilient. In the first couple of months, there was a 3% increase in overall demand compared to the same period in the previous year.
Notably, the appetite for gasoline surged, showing a significant rise of 21% compared to last year. Let's take a look at the cracks for the first quarter of 2024 in comparison to last year and five-year average on this page. In the first quarter, diesel cracks averaged at $26.5 per barrel, close to the peak of five-year range, mainly due to the elevated geopolitical tensions. Drone attacks on Russian refineries, Red Sea tensions supported the diesel cracks in this quarter. Nevertheless, the figures for first quarter still fell short of the previous year's levels, owing to a high base and the reduction in demand for heating fuel due to milder winter temperatures. Jet fuel cracks averaged $23.7 per barrel in the first quarter of 2024, a decrease influenced by the higher benchmarks set the previous year.
With air travel volumes rebounding to the levels seen before the pandemic, this has provided some support for the cracks for jet fuel within the quarter. Gasoline cracks averaged $19 per barrel in the first quarter of 2024. The combined effect of the high global demand and low utilization rates in U.S. refineries contributed to the increase in gasoline cracks. Additionally, similar to diesel, low inventory fuel levels due to geopolitical tensions and reroutings also supported gasoline cracks. High sulfur fuel oil cracks averaged around -$16 per barrel in the first quarter, up by $10 per barrel year-on-year. OPEC's voluntary cut decision and change in supply chain supported high sulfur fuel oil cracks in the first quarter of 2024. Moving over to the crude price differentials.
Amid escalating geopolitical conflicts, the differentials in the first quarter of 2024 expanded compared to the preceding quarter. On an annual basis, though, the differentials have contracted. Despite the broader spreads presented by the Basra Heavy, our product mix did experience the effects relative to the first quarter of the previous year. With the RUP under maintenance, our crude slate has transitioned into includes a greater proportion of lighter grades, which typically have much narrower spreads against Brent. With the ongoing geopolitical issues, it is difficult to provide a guidance for the trend of the differentials. Now let's take a look at the Tüpraş operations, starting with production volume. Our production in first quarter of 2024 was 5.9 million tons, higher than last year, even though one month is affected by RUP maintenance, which started on the first of March.
For the total crude distillation, we attained a capacity utilization of 76%, and the utilization rate for processing other feedstock stood at 6%, resulting in a system-wide rate of 82% during the first quarter of 2024. Moving over to the sales. Let's start with the chart on the left-hand side. In the first quarter, our domestic and international sales increased to 5.1 million tons and 1.9 million tons respectively, summing up to 7 million tons in total, which represents a 10% increase in sales compared to the first quarter of 2023. Our domestic sales, parallel to last year, the 8% decrease in diesel sales was offset by a 24% rise in gasoline sales.
Our international sales increased by 60% year-on-year, primarily driven by 143% increase in gasoline and 125% increase in high sulfur fuel oil exports. Now let's move to the electricity operations. This slide summarizes electricity production and sales activities of Entek and Tüpraş in the first quarter of 2024. In the first quarter, 56% of the electricity generated was from hydropower, 25% was from wind power, and the rest was CCGT and solar power. Out of 346 GWh of zero-carbon electricity produced, around 70% was sold to feed-in tariff, which is $72 per MWh. The rest were sold to the spot market. Acquisition of Kınık Wind Power Plant increased the production of Entek and contributed to the EBITDA generation.
Preliminary works on the recently acquired three licenses of 653 MW have started. Now let's move to the financials. Taking a look at the P&L items in detail for the first quarter of 2024 on this slide. Within the IAS 29 standards, all financials that are provided in this presentation and are in our quarterly financials report is calculated with inflation adjustments. Additionally, the financial figures for 2023 first quarter have been scaled up by a factor of 1.69, in accordance with the first quarter of 2024 CPI, in order to reflect the purchasing power of the current quarter. Revenues came in at TRY 165 billion, equivalent of almost $5.4 billion in the first quarter, which is up by 3% compared to the last year's first quarter.
Cost of goods sold stood at TRY 152 billion, affected by narrow differentials and route maintenance as we move to the lighter grades. Gross profit was TRY 13 billion, with lower cracks and narrow differentials. Operational expenses were predominantly affected by elevated logistics expenses. Loss from other operations increased due to effect loss from trade payables. As usual, this amount has a counterpart in our gross profit as inventory gains. Almost TRY 300 million income was recorded from equity investments, coming dominantly from OPEC. In the first quarter of 2024, we recorded financial income of TRY 3.2 billion, originating from increased interest income. The monetary loss of TRY 5.6 billion primarily stems from adjustments for inflation on retained earnings.
As a conclusion of this, we have recorded TRY 1.9 billion of profit before tax in the first quarter of 2024. Below profit before tax, we have recorded TRY 1.5 billion tax expense, which was lower than last year because same period as the tax, as the tax is calculated based on the index financials. And as a result, we have recorded TRY 320 million of net income in the first quarter. Now for EBITDA, our EBITDA CCS materialized at TRY 6.3 billion. Year-over-year decrease was mainly driven by inflation outpacing the depreciation of Turkish lira. Around TRY 460 million of this EBITDA was recorded from our electricity production company, Entek.
While our hedging methodology helped us to mitigate the brand pricing risk for approximately two-thirds of our crude oil inventory, we recorded over TRY 3 billion positive inventory effect, mainly due to depreciation of Turkish lira. Consequently, our reported EBITDA materialized at TRY 9.6 billion. Now let's take a look at the profit before tax bridge. As you can see from the waterfall chart, TRY 6.7 billion negative impact came from crack margins, weaker crack margins. Despite crack margins still performing above the average, this has led to a sizable decrease when compared to the higher margins of the previous year. Around TRY 5.2 billion negative impact came in from narrow differentials compared to last year. The combined positive effect of inventory and increasing sales stood at TRY 4.4 billion.
The net interest income has a positive impact on our financial results for this quarter, as it was realized at TRY 4.5 billion, balancing the negative effect of TRY 5 billion arising from effects on monetary loss. Regarding the first quarter of 2024's performance, our EBITDA generation was weaker, mainly due to weaker cracks and RUP maintenance. And since EBITDA is adjusted with purchasing power adjustment, but interest income is not, with the completion of RUP maintenance, we expect our EBITDA generation to improve, which will lead to stronger financial performance during the high season in this year. All in all, 2024 first quarter profit before taxes materialized at TRY 1.9 billion. Now let's take a look at the financial highlights.
In 2024's first quarter, we have recorded TRY 9.6 billion of EBITDA, decreasing from TRY 20.1 billion in the first quarter of 2023. As the crack margins are below last year's level and differentials are comparably narrower. Accordingly, we have recorded TRY 320 million of net profit in the first quarter of 2024. Cash and cash equivalents and financial liabilities at the end of the first quarter were TRY 91 billion and TRY 39 billion respectively. We ended the quarter with TRY 51.6 billion of net cash position, preserving our strong cash. With ongoing delevering, our net debt to EBITDA materialized at -0.5 times as of the end of the first quarter.
On the working capital side, the rerouting caused by the Red Sea extended the cargo duration, led to an increase in inventory, causing an increase in working capital requirement for this quarter. Now, looking at the maintenance calendar for 2024. We operated with 82.1% capacity utilization rate in the first quarter of this year. We kicked off our RUP maintenance on the first day of March, which was set to last 92 days, and there is no change in relation to our guidance of $196 million EBITDA impact from this maintenance. On this slide, we have our expectations for 2024. Looking at the details, based on our operational performance in the first quarter and ongoing development, we haven't changed the $14 per barrel full year crack margin guidance.
Regarding production and sales figures, there is no change in our expectations as well. We still expect approximately 26 million tons of production and approximately 30 million tons of sales. We expect capacity utilization to be within a range of 85%-90%, mainly due to plant maintenance shared in detail in our previous slide. Our consolidated CapEx target for 2024 is $500 million. On this slide, we would like to sum up some of the key figures for the first quarter and compare them with our 2024 full year guidance. We had a weighted average crack margin of $14.5 per barrel in the first quarter of 2024, which is slightly above our full year guidance of $14 per barrel, largely driven by elevated crack performance.
Capacity utilization was at 82.1% in the first quarter due to group maintenance, which is below our guidance range of 85%-90% for the whole year. In the first quarter, we produced 5.9 million tons and sold 7 million tons. We have spent $79 million in the first quarter as CapEx. This slide concludes our presentation, and we can now proceed with the Q&A session.
The first question comes from the line of Ildar Khaziev with HSBC. Please go ahead. Mr. or Miss Ildar Khaziev , can you hear me?
Yes, sorry. Yes, hello, sorry, I was muted. I'm sorry. Thank you very much for your presentation. I have a few questions. First of all, maybe, could you please-
... explain, you know, in the simplest possible way, how exactly this inflation accounting reporting works, specifically in your case? I mean, do you inflate all of your costs and revenues or only the one Turkish lira denominated? So I think that's my first question. And secondly, is it possible to disclose the CCS EBITDA, which was in the fourth quarter of the last year? Because I don't think we've seen it. And maybe lastly, is my understanding correct that under this new inflation accounting methodology, you don't really report any trading effects, gains, and losses anymore? Thank you.
Sorry, Hildar, we couldn't get the third one, the last one.
Yes. Is my understanding correct that under this new inflation adjusted accounting and methodology, you don't really have any operating effects gains, and losses? Is that the reason why you don't show them separately this time? And maybe lastly, when you refer to CMB reports at the footnotes on the slide with the income statement, Page 13, are these statutory accounts or these inflation adjusted accounts? Thank you.
Hi, Javier, it's Doğan speaking. Let me try to give you an understanding to the effects of inflationary adjustments with this opportunity, obviously, as simple as I can. First of all, remember the retained earnings on Tüpraş's balance sheet is on the high side. And in the inflationary accounting methodology, I mean, there is a calculation of an opportunity cost of that capital being deployed in the operations of the company. And that amount is equal to the inflation during the period. And in comparison to the same period of last year, it is the annual inflation from that point onward, which is 69% as of end of March.
In normal operations, obviously, you're using this capital deployed, first of all, in your operations, including CapEx. And at the same time, you're ending up with cash, which creates interest income on your P&L. Before you're doing your adjustments, the interest income is readily available, sitting on your P&L, helping your profitability to go up. But once you do the adjustment, it is with the inflation rate. So let's say, in the market, you're getting 50%-55% in your deposits in Turkish liras, whereas the discounting happening because of the inflationary adjustment is equal to the inflation amount, which is higher than the interest rate you're getting.
So although the cash in hand is kind of a balancing act for the opportunity cost of the capital deployed or the retained earnings, in the case of Turkish market dynamics at the moment, it creates a negative carry equal to, say, 10%-15% because of the current market interest rates being lower than the inflation rate. And this quarter, obviously, you would know, is kind of the weakest quarter in general in refineries. But in the case of Tüpraş, and especially for this year, this quarter is obviously the quarter where we took the RUP facilities into plant maintenance.
Therefore, the income we are getting on an unadjusted basis is mostly from interest income, whereas the EBITDA is on the low side, and it will definitely... I mean, we will pick up as we get into the peak season. So, the contributors to our P&L are the interest income, less of EBITDA because of low season and maintenance. But if you look at the opportunity cost that we're paying, which is called the monetary loss in this adjustment, is the highest in the first quarter. Because you're using most of your capital because you have not distributed your dividend yet.
Remember, we distributed the dividend on the 1st of April, so it's not within this set of accounts, which creates an additional burden in terms of that opportunity cost, the monetary loss. CapEx is lighter in the first quarter because any CapEx expenditure would eat up from that accumulated capital retained earnings. As you spend more on CapEx throughout the year, it will again decrease the monetary loss you're having in your P&L. Therefore, we are having this impact, mostly the highest, most probably the highest in the first quarter of the year. But I am sure it needs a bit of an additional explanation with your questions and comments in due course.
It's very difficult to give that understanding to you before you go through the details of our accounts and come back with your additional questions.
Let me take the other one regarding the EBITDA CCS, we continue to provide that. It's on slide 13, and for this quarter, it's 6.3 billion Turkish lira, and we will continue to provide that. Regarding the last two questions, the inflation account application to the P&L items, it's applied to the every P&L item. So, it is included even EBITDA CCS is now with the inflationary accounting adjustment. And with that, I would like to also remind that this is by regulation in Turkey.
Understood. Thank you very much. Very useful and very complicated indeed. Thank you.
The next question comes from the line of Marianna Gish with UBS. Please go ahead.
Good day. Thank you very much for your presentation. I actually trying to compile the EBITDA development, and yes, the refining margins were lower in differentials, as you said as well. But they didn't drop to the same amount, so I want to check what were the developments on the OpEx side, and whether you saw an increase in OpEx, and if you can give some color on that. And the second question would be on the biofuels announcement you recently did. Yeah, great developments on the feedstock side, but I also wanted to check, you stated that FID could now be done by the end of next year.
I wanted to check whether it provides for some possible delays off from your earlier comments of the start-up of SAF production in late 2026, early 2027. Thank you very much.
Thank you for your question. Let's start with your question in regards to the OpEx, but actually, on a wider perspective, it's really the margins we make. So there isn't any substantial change in our OpEx. The decrease in EBITDA really comes from the issues that you have already mentioned, i.e., the crack margins and the differentials. Looking into the cracks first, obviously it is a weighted average of our cracks and not having the RUP facility in place in part of the quarter. That has been, I mean, it has been more inclined to the heavy side of the products.
Therefore, the overall crack is an average of a refinery, which is less complex, let me put it that way. Same goes for the differentials. Obviously, we are getting lighter crudes to process with the absence of RUP in the last month of the quarter. That has an effect on the differentials as well. Otherwise, differentials we are experiencing in the market in the first quarter, which you can follow on one of our slides, has not changed much in the first quarter of this year. It's more about the weight, the mix, which causes that. Your questions on biofuels.
In as per our agreement with the supplier, the long-term supplier, we have the option to somewhat make the final decision in the coming year. So that's kind of an optionality. It's not a change in the direction because we haven't start spending CapEx on site yet. We're in detailed engineering phase of our SAF production unit project. We put that optionality, but there hasn't been a major change in the direction until today. Years might change. I assume the production would start more closer to, say, end of 2027 to or to the beginning of 2028. But that is not related to the agreement we have in place.
We will also start trading the feedstock prior to having the units on site. Therefore, we will be the sellers of the product earlier than we have the facilities on site.
Thank you very much.
The next question comes from the line of Leszek Barański with Millennium. Please go ahead.
Thank you for holding the conference and giving opportunity to ask questions. And let me start with slide number 17. Here you show maintenance starting March first, and it should last like 13 weeks. So it means that if I understand correctly, it should end up end of May. Am I correct?
Yes, Leszek, you are correct. End of May, the first week of June, it makes.
Okay. And another question to the same table then. We've got Izmir Refinery, and we've got Q1 and 7 weeks of maintenance, and so it's crude oil vacuum and HYC. Is it hydrocracker?
Yes, that's correct. That stands for hydrocracker.
Okay. So then if we go to appendix, yeah, so appendix Slide 24, it shows your white product yield, and as you mentioned earlier during the call, that, yeah, your white product yield is lower, and fuel oil yield is much higher. I guess it's because of both of these maintenances, yeah, and it probably was the most visible in March.
Yes, Leszek, that's correct. Not only the RUP maintenance starting in March, but the other maintenances, including the hydrocracker in Izmir in the beginning of the year, causes this decrease in white product yield.
Okay. And on the same slide, yeah, there is, as you already mentioned as well, you've got API here, which shows that you use a bit lighter oil as well. So if I add both of these two things together, basically, your general average crack spread, which is presented on the first slide or a few, one of the first slides, it's I guess it's average general, so it's not reflecting your actual crude oil slate, which is, yeah, when you buy lighter oil, yeah, you pay more. And it's not reflecting this weaker like, like, product slate as well, because you've got more fuel oil.
The average of the crack definitely includes the yield, the change in the yield.
Ah, okay.
But obviously, not the differentials, because it is calculated on Brent.
Okay. So it includes like, the actual realization of, of your, of your production, so it includes much higher fuel oil yield. Is that correct?
Exactly. Exactly. That's, that's the actual yield.
Okay.
Not the normal yield. It is the actual yield with the absence of those units.
Okay. So then coming back to Slide 17, with all this maintenance, so yeah, it, it looks like quarter two should be, yeah, much, much more impacted by this RUP maintenance, and the yields and utilization should be even lower.
Yes, correct. But, mind you, obviously, when we have given the year-end expectation on the crack margins, that is, again, with the weight that we are expecting, with including all these maintenances. So the yield-
Understood
... is going to be the actual yield for the year. So this was expected.
Yeah, yeah, understood. Yeah, just trying to understand how badly 2Q numbers will look like. And it, yeah, when I look at execution in 1Q and much heavier maintenance in 2Q, so 2Q should be quite ugly. But then second half of the year should be much, much better. But, but, but looks like 2Q will be very bad. Yeah, so do you have such impression as well, or, or I'm wrong?
I would definitely not use the same words.
Okay. Sorry for that.
Maybe on the production side and on the yield side, yes, there will be a bigger impact on the RUP maintenance. But at the same time, I mean, officially, fifteenth of May is the beginning of the driving season.
Yes.
June is expected to be a full month where the RUP maintenance is over. Therefore, with better crack margins and a full month in the heart of peak season, I don't necessarily expect a very negative period.
Okay. First two months, yeah, might be okay, weaker than in first Q on average, but last month could be much better.
Yes, I agree. June is a very important month.
Okay.
I mean, coinciding with the end of RUP maintenance and then the peak season, all of them together.
Yes. Understood. Because, yeah, if I go to Page 13 with the EBITDA CCS, and try to divide by exchange rate, so I end up with EBITDA $200 million. And, yeah, so, yeah, it's quite painful, yeah, this March RUP maintenance. And so it, yeah, it can be very painful in 2Q. But then as you're right, yeah, once we are back to, to like, full season and full capacity utilization, then we should be back to like, like, very good performance last year, like, for example, last year. But I'm trying to figure out how painful could be second Q, and, yeah, it's, it looks like, yeah, yeah, it can be...
Yeah, it could be relatively even weaker, I guess, than Q1, because RUP maintenance is longer, and crack spreads right now, they are weaker, I would say, than in Q1.
Yeah, but, but, I mean, you, you would know even better than me, Leszek. Or, or I mean, theoretically, if you consider two months, two months being, say, January and June, even if you don't have any maintenance in, in, in, in, in a, in a, an ordinary January, capacity utilizations would definitely be higher as you get into, the, the high season. Therefore, yes, we will only have 1 full month in June, but one should expect capacity utilizations being higher in the second quarter in an ordinary refinery setting. Therefore, that would be a bigger multiplier, if the crack margins are, are healthy. Yes, they are, they are, yeah, they are, a bit on the low side, especially, middle distillate.
Pretty much like last year, I must say, because remember, when the winter was over last year, in April, we ended up globally with high level of inventories because it was a milder winter. Interestingly, we had a similar winter, and in April, we ended up with the same picture in front of us. The crack margins were lower because the inventories were higher. But in a normal demand profile, those inventories are somewhat eaten up in a matter of weeks with high demand during peak season. And you then start seeing a normal, healthier crack margins.
The current signals we're getting in the last couple of weeks from the market are at least in the right direction in that respect, but one should still, I mean, wait and see what June brings to us.
Okay, understood. Thank you very much. And maybe the last question is regarding Red Sea, because there are some developments, there are some peace talks, maybe, maybe not. So but I guess you still see some, maybe some logistics disruptions over there, because, yeah, theoretically, it can support you in Q3, when there will be driving season, everyone would like to buy products. And yeah, if there is any logistics disruptions, then, yeah, difficulties, maybe not disruptions, difficulties, then yeah, markets can become tight.
Yeah.
Well, actually, this is quite, I mean, a sad event. We don't want that to happen. But at the same time, of course, in terms of the overall effect on the profitability, you can think of that like the energy prices of couple of years ago. Because the tankers are traveling through the Cape of Good Hope, the logistics expenses are on the rise. But I presume they are being reflected in European prices, which is being reflected to our product prices in Turkey, as we're using the same formula.
So, in the crack margins, there might be an additional contribution coming from the increase in logistics costs, but at the same time, you wouldn't feel it on the bottom line because then you're giving it away as logistics expenses. In our case, it can also be felt from the working capital requirement, because, I mean, we have a couple of tankers traveling around Africa at the moment, which somewhat normalizes our working capital requirement even further from the minuses we have seen in the recent years.
Understood. Thank you very much. Thank you.
You're welcome, Leszek. Thank you.
The next question comes from the line of Jonathan Lamb with Wood & Co. Please go ahead.
Can you hear me now?
Yes, we can.
I was looking at the income statement on Page 13, and I calculated the effective tax rate. I wonder if you could explain to me, 'cause there's obviously something I don't understand here. In the first quarter last year, it was 77%, and in this quarter, it was 83%. I'm assuming this is something I don't understand about the new form of accounting. Thank you.
Hello, Jonathan, this is Zeynep, head of reporting. Annual tax, tax expense includes both the tax expense and the first, the first tax expense. In here you can see the tax expense comes from accounts, so you cannot figure out where it comes from. When it comes to the first tax expense, we calculate it by comparing statutory and accounts. And again, we do not have this data. It is not public, so I cannot comment on that. But based on indexation in both accounts, it affects us negatively in this period.
Okay.
The next question comes from the line of Evgeniya Bystrova with Barclays. Please go ahead.
Hi. Hello. Thank you for the presentation. Can you hear me? Hello?
Yes, we can.
Okay, good. Good. Thanks. I just have a couple of questions. So my first question is on the first slide on the cash bridge. So obviously we see quite a substantial outflow on the working capital side. Is it all connected to the logistic costs, or what are the other effects, and what should we expect in terms of working capital in the next quarters? And my second question is, do you have any updates in terms of when you could be coming to the market to refinance the Eurobond? Yeah, that's it. Thank you.
Thank you for your question. Yes, the reason why the working capital requirement has deteriorated is because the tankers are traveling around Africa. It's not the cost itself, it's the additional capital we're deploying on that additional stocks on the sea. So it's the cost of a couple of crude tankers, cargoes of crude oil. That is, I hope that is temporary. But at the moment, that's the main reason. Mind you, we always said that having big minuses in working capital requirement is not normal. So the long-term target in that respect is being close to zero as much as possible.
But in the midterm, all things being equal, if we were to be able to use Suez during our cruise transportation, that would definitely be a correction in the working capital requirement, again, to the minuses. In terms of Eurobonds, the maturity of the current Eurobond is this October. At the moment, looking at the secondary levels or the current issuances from Turkish corporate, I would assume we would end up somewhere around 7% if we were to go for a five-year issuance. Having this much cash on the balance sheet at the moment, I'm still keen to see lower negative carry once we get into the market.
But having said that, we have still more than a quarter to go before we pay back the current outstanding loan. Even if we were to pay back first, we would definitely somewhat target to be back in the market first, when we need the money or when the negative carry is lower. We are able to get, I mean, more than 5% in deposit rate, but it's still a substantial negative carry, so we're following the market.
Thank you very much. Just one quick follow-up on the working capital. On the slide, I think it was slide 15, there is also, like, a graph of working capital, which says 5.7 in first quarter. Could you please explain what, what exactly that is?
Yeah, that's, that's working capital requirement on the positive side, whereas in the past it was minus.
and it's-
So capital being used. Sorry?
In lira.
In liras, yes, yes. Billion Turkish lira.
Okay, good. Thank you.
Thank you.
The next question is a follow-up question from Javier Hildar with HSBC. Please go ahead.
Yes. Hi. Thank you again. I have a follow-up question on taxation. So I'm looking at your cash flow statement, and I would presume that the tax payments would not be distorted that much by the inflation accounting methodology. Maybe I'm wrong. If I'm correct, is it fair to say that because your tax payments last year in first quarter 2023, and this year, in the first quarter of this year, were pretty much similar, slightly lower only? Would it be fair to say that these, you know, that kind of reflects a true trend in statutory profit before tax? So meaning that it wasn't that different year-on-year, you know, if you just look at the tax payments. So that's my first question.
And then secondly, if I recall correctly, last year in the first quarter, I think you have booked some sort of income or margin on importing diesel because you also had a lot of shutdowns during that quarter. Is my understanding correct, that this year, you obviously also had to import diesel? Is my understanding correct, that you may have not achieved the same profitability of those operations? Thank you.
Thank you for your question. I mean, Zeynep can give you more information on that, but to summarize, really, the biggest tax impact comes from the revaluation or readjustment of the future tax benefit. Remember, in the past, we were having additional benefit from revaluating our future tax incentives, whereas this time, when we are adjusting backwards, we're having a negative impact on our tax. A good counter... I mean, a good explanation on that is exactly what you have mentioned. On the cash flow, you don't see a delta on a tax impact because you're not paying this as a tax. That is the adjustment of your overall tax liability, which is mostly coming from the future tax incentives. That was about tax.
In terms of diesel, you would see, although the Turkish market has been growing in the first quarter, our sales in diesel is not in line with the growth in the Turkish market, which means we're not trying to catch up with the increase in the Turkish domestic demand during the absence of our RUP facility. Yes, we do have some imports from time to time, but we're not exploiting the situation. The diesel sales will definitely increase, which we mostly from our, I mean, if not all, from our own production. But in the interim, when we were lacking the conversion units, it was most of the distributors in the country who made the imports themselves.
Understood. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
We have a follow-up question from the line of Muharrem Gürsever with Kona Capital Advisors. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much for the presentation. You, and I mean, on, on the presentation, you announced the weighted average crack margin is 14.5, but when we make the math on ourselves, I mean, with the announced figures, we arrived to a number of like $12 per share. So where do you think this $2.5 per barrel is coming from? Thank you.
Hi, Muharrem, thank you for the question. This is Erhan. We are calculating the weighted average crack margin from sales yield. That's the, probably the-
That's the premium of Tüpraş, okay, and it's not the benchmark margin. Okay, thank you.
Thank you.
But, let me clarify. It's not based on production yield of the Tüpraş but sales yield, and sales is different compared to the product. And as a result of that, if you multiply the crack with Tüpraş design capacity, you will not be reaching the weighted average crack margin that we have provided, which is $14.5 per barrel.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, there are no further questions at this time. I will now turn the conference over to management for any closing remarks. Thank you.
Thank you once again for joining us this evening for the first quarter call of 2024. Before we end, I'd like to share a few closing remarks. It is important to recognize the complexity of inflation accounting. Our intention and ongoing efforts are dedicated to making this a regulatory principle more understandable and accessible to all our stakeholders. This approach ensures that our financial statements are not only transparent, but also comparable with those of previous periods, offering a more consistent and reliable view of our financial performance over time. And I would like to remind that inflation accounting will be with us for some time, so taking a stance to assess company numbers without these adjustments would be misleading.
As you know, operational availability have always been a key company notion, but it was also pivotal to our record high profitability over the last two years. We believe our operational excellence will ensure high profitability as the product margin starts showing signs of high season, and we are nearing completion of RUP maintenance to capture this. Moreover, our strong cash position provides us flexibility in capital deployment and allow us to continue our investments and pay dividends. This also demonstrates the strength and resilience of our balance sheet, as our extensive cash reserves and the capacity for dividends remains robust. Monetary loss coming from inflationary adjustments, being a non-cash item, does not distract from these resources. You will recall from our recent announcement that we have reached a significant milestone in our strategic transition plan last week, securing long-term feedstock procurement.
With amounts covering the needs of our ongoing SAF production unit project, we will be able to support our customers under several different scenarios of SAF Blending requirements for European Union and Turkey. You will be hearing more on our plan as we tirelessly work on it. We are dedicated to maintaining the highest standards of financial clarity and integrity, ensuring that our stakeholders are well informed and confident in our strategic direction and financial performance. Please keep in touch with your follow-up questions and comments on our current results and expectations, and we will be very happy to give you a better understanding. I appreciate your time and trust in our company. Thank you all for listening to us, and we all wish you a wonderful evening.