Second quarter, a lot has been going on. In June, we announced that there will be no threat of Russian crude. We have relieved the entire region from Russian crude. We are looking at cheap energy. We drove down the prices of electricity for seven million, a hundred million of Poles. We have installed the first Polish, the first ever Polish offshore wind turbines on the Baltic Sea, and the Baltic Power will deliver clean energy. We will pay a record high dividend at PLN 6 on September 1st. Our bold and responsible decisions that we take on a daily basis at ORLEN take us closer to our goal. The energy of tomorrow, that starts today.
Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the earnings call, at which we'll present and discuss the consolidated financial results of the ORLEN Group after the second quarter. More details will be discussed by Ireneusz Fafara and Magdalena Bartoś in a second. It is a pleasure to see you at ORLEN's headquarters. There are a lot of people in the room, such a great turnout. My name is Marek Gołębiewski, I'm the IR Director, and I welcome all of you. You are very much welcome to ask questions. Without further ado.
The floor is yours.
The floor is yours. Ireneusz Fąfara , President of the Management Board and CEO. Good morning. Welcome to our headquarters. As you saw, there are a lot of tasks for the CEO, and sometimes I am even asked to star, to be a star in a video, such as the one you have just seen. As for the performance after the second quarter and the first half of the year, we are keeping up with the momentum and delivering on our commitments. At the beginning of the year, we decided to take on a lot of challenges, looking forward to the future. We talked about what happened in the first half of the year, but I will repeat it one more time.
There is no longer Russian crude across the ORLEN Group, and we do hope that there will be no Russian crude in the future across the region and the world. We believe it and will stick to it. During the construction of the first offshore wind farm, Baltic Power, we have already installed half of the foundations as well as turbines, first turbines, and we believe that next year it will be brought on stream and it will supply electricity to almost 1.5 million households. It is important for the Polish economy because we believe that it will contribute to the building of the brand new field, an area of the Polish economy, which will provide equipment for this particular area. Our competitors have already started, and this new area of our activity will be useful for them as well.
We drove down the price of gas by 15% in the first half of the year. It is important because those who use gas to heat their households will be able to see lower gas bills by as much as PLN 1,000 per year. We care for our consumers. We will offer the lowest possible price. At the same time, we will ensure the highest possible security. We do not forget about our investors, our stakeholders as well, shareholders as well. The capitalization of the company exceeded PLN 100 million. We saw record-breaking results, and we have shown that we are able to operate responsibly, taking care of our stakeholders and the environment and our investors, and we are able to keep it up. Lower prices of energy translate to lower revenue.
However, we managed to double our EBITDA life of result, which, as we always say together with Magda, is a key management ratio. From your point of view, you will always focus on the net profit, and as we said, we doubled this ratio versus the last year. It could be, or could have been actually higher. However, we still see some effects of the wrong decisions taken by our predecessors. Second quarter saw lower prices of energy, great investments, and high profits. Let us look at the breakdown by segment. Lower prices of gas for households by 14.5%. I said that before. As of July 1st, you will see lower bills for 7 million Poles. We increased the number of customers and the users of our Vitay app, which has become our main tool for communication with the client, going up by over 20%.
We saw higher sales for EV vehicles. It's very important. Marek, thank you and your team for your commitment, for your involvement, especially right now when the great campaign is actually going on as we speak in our fuel stations. Thank you very much. Downstream, higher security, higher production, no Russian crude. This is something that is really important. Instead of Russian crude, we buy crude from all over the world, especially from the Middle East, thanks to our great business relationship with Saudi Aramco. We are one of the biggest Saudi Aramco clients, but we also buy crude from the Persian Gulf, North Sea, Africa, and both Americas. This is the security that we promised to the Poles.
What's important for us, especially important for us from two perspectives, from two angles, emotional and business angle, is that we are able to work closely with our partners from Ukraine, especially with Naftogaz, a peer of ORLEN in Ukraine, so to speak. We signed a memorandum of understanding for the cooperation in production upstream, downstream, as well as strengthening of our commercial trade and business relations. At the same time, we consistently provide 100 million cubic meters more of the blue fuel through our terminal in Szczecin and [Lwynia]. We believe that the 100,000 per month will be maintained in the future, and we'll be able to support our partners in their very difficult situation that they are at. We doubled the capacity of our terminal in Szczecin, strengthening the security in this region and the region in general.
We also completed the work on the expansion of the gas terminal for LPG, and we involve Polish companies only in this project. At the same time, even though it's very difficult because our resources have been largely exploited, I mean energy resources, we are trying to step up on the domestic production. We are looking at 4 million tons as a target for this year, and we started new drillings at the Trzebusz field, and we do hope that we will reach our target by 2030. As far as downstream is concerned, we began as a refining business, and it's still a very important pillar of our business. Even though the prospects for downstream are not that promising compared to our other business areas, it is still a great source of our revenues. We secured PLN 1.7 million for the production of hydrogen fuel, blue fuel.
It is very important for us and very promising, and we secured that amount from the National Recovery Plan, and we do hope that it will be earmarked for the launch of two new installations. We started work on the patented multi-fuel technology. This technology allows us to burn either gas or hydrogen or the mixture of both substances. This is a Polish technology, and we have pioneered this technology all over the world, and we do hope that our work we have just started will translate into tangible results. The sustainable aviation fuel, SAF, is available at three airports in Poland already. We do hope that we will expand with this product as well, this innovative product, and we will increase the number of airports that offer sustainable aviation fuel.
We have expanded the production of biomethane in cooperation with KGS, as we said when we presented the strategy for 2035. This is one of our areas of activity, and together with this partner, we are going to create a group that will produce and deliver biomethane. Energy is a great construction site, so to speak. The first Baltic Power turbines have been installed. Work is going on as we speak. Half of the foundation combinations have been already installed, as well as five turbines, and we will install eight more turbines by the end of the year. We do believe that at the beginning of next year or next year, we will start supplying electricity to Polish households. That will represent around 3% of electricity in Poland.
The next location, Baltic East, which is adjacent to the Baltic Power license, is getting ready to the auction coming up in December. We are in the process of securing environmental permits. We want to take part in this auction, and we do hope that we will win it. We have launched the offshore installation terminal in Świnoujście with a bit of a delay versus our original plans. We do not believe this is our fault. We believe that the work that started a couple of years ago on the construction of this particular farm took a little bit too much time. We did not have a chance to actually tap into the synergies, but we still keep cooperating with our partners, and we do hope it will bring fruit.
We also launched the installation terminal in Łeba that will work 24/7 in order to make sure that Baltic Power wind farm operates as planned. Grid upgrade and extension. We signed a contract for the upgrade of power grids across Poland. We have already increased those upgraded grids. We connected 700,000 new customers. As far as corporate functions are concerned, this is very important for all of us, but for me specifically, is the fact that we secured, we increased security and safety of our employees. This ratio has been doubled. We will do our best in order to make sure that our employees work in a safe manner. We issued great green bonds, and Magda will discuss it later on.
The fact that we sold those green green euro bonds in 12 minutes with an oversubscription by more than 2.5 shows that it met with a lot of interest among investors, and it is a sign of the trust as well, and we are very proud of that. In terms of our cooperation with the sports world and the institution of culture and educational institutions, this is very important to us as well. We cooperated with MIT and Cambridge University. We organized the Powering Future Conference, and we believe that the very start of our cooperation, this is the very start of cooperation with such renowned institutions, research institutions all over the world. What's very important to all of you, we will pay out record-breaking dividend at PLN 6 per share in September.
Good morning, everyone. I'm also very happy to see you in our headquarters.
[Foreign language].
My task will be to discuss our financial performance in quarter two. Irek has mentioned a bit about it. I'll try to take a deeper dive for you to understand the drivers behind our financial performance in the second quarter. Let us start with revenues. Revenue in the second quarter came in at nearly PLN 61 billion , going down by around 13% year on year, which just as in the first quarter was caused by the macro environment. What's really important, however, is the fact that those lower revenues did not translate into lower EBITDA, which came in at PLN 9.2 billion , going up by PLN 2.4 billion year on year.
As [Irek] has mentioned, and I will repeat it and emphasize it again, we are always looking at our EBITDA life of ratio because this is the ratio that we and our other place in the market consider the most efficient ratio of our business. The fact that we did not have any gas windfall charge in the second quarter is really important because in the second quarter 2024, it represented PLN 7.7 billion. At the same time, we want to emphasize the fact that, again, as a group, we functioned and operated in a much more challenging macro environment versus 2024, especially in terms of our margins for upstream and supply, as well as petrochemical margins and refining margins in downstream. Therefore, the fact that we exceeded PLN 9 billion in EBITDA in a relatively weaker quarter is very, very solid.
We have increased our cash flows from operations year on year. On the one hand, it was related to higher operational performance, but on the other hand, we had lower working capital, and this was due to lower prices. Our net debt is around zero at the end of the second quarter, which is comparable to quarter one. At the end of the second quarter, our cash and cash equivalents came in at PLN 0.5 billion, which is a great point for us because we are getting ready to pay out the highest ever dividend to our investors at PLN 6 per share. We had the issue of green bonds. This was not the only measure that we've taken in order to finance the greatest investment and CapEx plans in the group's history.
These included National Recovery Plan resources and the agreement that we had with the European Investment Bank, and not only those green bonds. A lot has been going on therefore, and I would like to thank everybody who is involved in the raising of the financing and securing of the financing for our activities. As I mentioned before, the second quarter should be considered to be seasonally weaker against the background of our all-year-round operations. This is due to lower sales of energy and gas in summer months. Obviously, when it's hotter outside, our sales go down, but also we have maintenance breakdowns and overhauls.
Looking at our operational data year on year, starting from upstream and supply, and production of gas and crude went down by 11% and 16% respectively, which was due mainly to our work on an Ormen Lange Phase 3 field, which was actually closed earlier than planned, and it contributes to our performance already. A wholesale of gas went up due to a higher demand among our industrial customers, as well as higher prices. Refining sales was similar to last year's. However, in terms of our petrochemical sales, it went down, which was due to very competitive markets and higher imports to Europe on the back of high imports from the United States and from Asia.
The production of electricity went up by 27%, which was due to higher installed capacity, which we added to our group, especially in the area of renewable energy sources, but also due to a higher production of our conventional units on the back of higher demand from operators. Heat production went up by 9%, which was mainly driven by lower temperatures in May. You might not remember after the hot summer, but May was a very cold month. Seasonally low temperatures in the month of May translated into distribution of gas, which actually went up year on year in general, but also in terms of sales of gas in the segment of consumers and products. Wholesale of gas and of fuels stayed comparable year on year. The next slide will analyze the impact of regulations and macro environment on our segments.
I would like to look especially at the higher result of upstream and supply, which was mainly due to the lack of the gas windfall charge. Another positive driver year on year were higher prices of gas. However, we had negative drivers as well, lower prices of crude and lower margins on wholesale. Lower performance of the downstream segment were due to lower margins both for refining and petrochemicals, but higher performance in the energy segment was due to higher volumes of gas and electricity distribution. In terms of consumers and products performance, the higher result was due to higher sales of gas and the maintenance of margins. What's also important in this slide is the fact that the performance of the downstream segment in the second half of the last year was strengthened by the compensation on the back of the breakdown of one of our installations.
We did not have that compensation this year. Therefore, those results cannot be compared. Let us look at our investment plans and CapEx spending. We decided to spend nearly PLN 14 million, translating into 40% of our planned CapEx spending. This is comparable to the levels that we saw in previous years. Throughout the year, however, we will meet our CapEx spending targets at PLN 35 billion, of which about 75% will be earmarked to growth projects. Let me recap by commenting on LIFO-based EBITDA for the group versus previous years. This slide presents the main drivers that impact our segments. What's important here is the fact that the refining market environment is very positive. It supports our performance in downstream, and on average, we can expect that the refining margin will be comparable to last year's.
I am mentioning it because at the beginning of the year, we took a more cautious approach, but we expect that our downstream performance will be better than expected in the end. In terms of our other segments, our expectations were in line with real results, so we feel comfortable that we will meet our LIFO-based EBITDA targets this year. Thank you very much for your attention. That would be all for today's presentation, and now we can move on to a Q&A session.
[Foreign language] .
Thank you very much for the presentation. Before we move on to the Q&A session, we will rearrange the room.
[Foreign language].
Please bear with us a little bit.
[Foreign language] .
We do not have anything planned for you for this break, so we just have to wait for a little bit to rearrange the room for our speakers before we give the floor over to you.
[Foreign language] .
Ireneusz Fąfara, Magdalena Bartoś, please join us. Join me on stage.
[Foreign language]
I'll give the floor over to you in the room.
[Foreign language] .
Since the turnout is so great today, please ask one question with no follow-ups, if you could.
Okay, [Foreign language] .
Wojciech Jakóbik, Podcast Energy. What are the prospects for a long-term agreement with Naftogaz for gas supplies?
With Naftogaz? [Foreign language].
To Ukraine and from Ukraine. To Ukraine. The CEO of Naftogaz will visit us in Poland tomorrow, and we will discuss it together, and also at the meeting of the Minister of State Assets. I'll be able to tell you a little bit more about it tomorrow or on Monday. Dominik Brodacki, Polityka Insight. What are the prospects for the agreement with Synthos under ORLEN Synthos Green Energy? When can we expect the signing of this agreement, and what are the next steps for the future, for the months to come? We believe in that technology. We decided to include it as part of our strategy. We're talking about a couple of SMRs last year. We promised that we would strike an agreement with Synthos by the end of the year.
It did not happen because already in last year, we have agreed on the JV, and we signed a draft agreement, but the project actually progressed as we spoke, and there were a couple of questions in terms of the accessibility of the technology and the financial settlement. We started to negotiate the financials, and as usual, when we start talking finance, especially in the case of such a pioneering, groundbreaking technology, this takes time. It did take time, but I can responsibly say that whatever was said publicly by the Prime Minister, that we can expect a decision by the end of the year, and I believe we can deliver on that promise. As far as the next steps to come, the project is in progress. We are talking about two locations, Włocławek and Stawy Monowskie. The process is in progress. There are no delays.
There are no hurdles on the way for the launch of two SMRs by the end of the year and maybe earlier. Aleksandra Herbin, [WP] Pro Portal. In yesterday's press release, you distanced yourself a little bit from the EU emission reduction goals. What are the realistic goals for you? Since you have distanced yourself from this overambitious EU policy, do you see any risks in terms of the market and the future of your investments? Because it poses a bit of a challenge. We'll keep to our promise, zero emission 2050. We're looking at what is going on around us in the world, and our competitors, sometimes our partners, actually delay the process, and they are transferring part of their businesses outside of Europe to other less ambitious regions.
We cannot do anything about it, but we should not actually turn a blind eye to it because this is a very costly process. Since we have competitors in the market, they have some other options to invest their money and to be more profitable. As we said, we'll stick to the 2050 goal. We have a very tangible proof that the financial markets believe in our strategy, in our energy transition strategy, and this strategy is a very pragmatic one and realistic one. We maintain a dialogue with our investors, and we received some feedback from them on our successful issue of green euro bonds that will be used towards those goals, energy transition goals. We also were evaluated by an independent agency, Moody's, for our projects, investment projects, and this evaluation was very, very good. There are great foundations to maintain our trust in the market.
[Foreign language].
Dziennik Gazeta Prawna. Alexander Hołownia, I'd like to ask you about the potential veto to the windmill, the so-called Windmill Act. It will definitely delay the process a little bit, but we believe that all our targets that we assumed in terms of renewable energy sources on the shore, as far as I remember, it was 1.5 GW of energy. We believe that those decisions will not impact our target. It might impact the progress, the speed of the works, but not the target itself. Wysoka Rado, [Foreign language] .
[Foreign language] .
Could you comment on the media news on the strategic processes for the Energa Group, strategic decisions concerning the Energa Group? Could you share a little bit with us about those strategic options? Our goal is to make sure that Energa remains the strongest energy group in Poland. This is an element of our strategy. How to get there is another story.
Irrespective of our own vision that we have, this vision must be translated into your competencies, your experience in the market. We decided to look at one partner, one option, and whether this option will be accepted by the supervisory board remains to be seen. The work is expected to take about eight weeks. The vision should be ready in early December, late November. Together with the advisor that we selected, we want to look at all the options that we have. You are in touch and up to date with everything that is published in the press and in the media. We want to present all the business options that we have that come from the synergies or the lack of synergies between ORLEN and Energa.
[Foreign language] .
Andrzej Kublik, Gazeta Wyborcza.
[Foreign language] .
During government reconstruction in mid-July, the Prime Minister said that driving down electricity prices will be a priority. I do believe that you have received that signal because you talked about lower prices of electricity and fuels.
[Foreign language].
What are you planning to do about it in the future? In order to drive down the electricity prices in the future as well, in line with declarations of the Prime Minister, irrespective of your targets concerning your profit, because this is what the Prime Minister said. The price is the priority and not the profits of certain companies, especially state-owned companies.
[Foreign language].
As you said, your wholesale results or wholesale performance went up, but the retail performance went down slightly. What we saw in the presentation was also the fact that the profits from retail sales of fuels are going up. We believe that ORLEN actually revamped its strategy and takes care of retail profits, which might not be very welcome by Poles, especially looking at the prices of fuels in your fuel stations versus the prices of your competitors, who usually buy their fuel in wholesale sales from you. Will you keep up with your strategy, or maybe the new Minister of State Assets has put any pressure on you already to revamp your strategy?
[Foreign language]
We do not look at it like you. We have our own commitments that come from the regulations that are in force, the Code of Commercial Companies, and we take care of our shareholders.
We will stick to those commitments. At the same time, our main concern, which was signaled in our strategy, is security and the lowest possible prices of energy, broadly understood. When I was commuting to work today, I saw $5.57 as a price of fuel at the fuel station, and ORLEN's fuels are sold by a very low price, so the lowest prices in years, actually. The scale of such increases based on wholesale sales that you have mentioned does not come from the fact that we are increasing those prices, but from the fact that we are expanding our operations, our business. We expanded the base of our clients who have customers who have access to our Vitay app, and it translates into higher retail sales, not only for fuel products, because in the consumers and products sector segment, actually half of our profits come from nonfuel sales.
We are expanding the packages of services as well, and our main goal is to provide security and ensure the lowest possible prices of energy carriers for everybody. Therefore, we can talk about the lowest prices of fuel products in three years and also the low prices of electricity and other fuel energy carriers.
[Foreign language]
The speaker is not using a microphone, so I cannot hear the question. Six months have passed since you actually published your strategy. What is your assessment of your performance in this period? The second question concerns the outlook for the upcoming six months of the year. What is the mood at ORLEN currently?
In terms of the delivering of our strategy, it is a long-term strategy. Every month we review it, and we review it quarterly as well in more detail. Let me put it this way. I was a little bit unsatisfied with how we were reviewing the performance of the strategy. Therefore, we decided to introduce some personal changes. In general, we see no threats to the delivery of our strategy. In terms of the outlook for the rest of the year, Magda will take over.
As I said before, we feel quite comfortable with the analysts' consensus on EBITDA for 2025, and the consensus places our performance higher year on year. There's a lot of work to be done, but the mood is quite optimistic, and it's positive. Looking at our individual segments, we are hoping for the continuation of the trends and the positive contribution of the macro environment and the downstream segment, translating into very solid results in this particular segment. As far as energy is concerned, we are talking about expansion. We are talking about higher installed capacity. As far as consumers and products segment is concerned, we are focusing on the client and on delivering or offering the lowest possible prices of energy carriers. I would like to come back to Mr. Kublik's question, because yes, you are right that I have not mentioned anything about heating.
We will have a press conference coming up. We will be able to talk a little bit more about heating during this press conference. I'll invite you to take part in it.
[Foreign language]
Any other questions from the room?
[Foreign language] .
It's just a tiny detail about the past that still translates into your present. Could you comment on the suggestions of the former President of the Management Board, Daniel Obajtek, concerning the arbitrage agreements with ORLEN Trading Switzerland? Is it true? Is it an arbitrage?
[Foreign language].
In the context of certain problems that we saw, when the United Arab Emirates did not agree to the extradition of the former Director General of OTS.
[Foreign language]
I never do it, but I'll take an exception. I would recommend that Daniel Obajtek, the former President of the Management Board and the current member of the European Parliament, refrain from such statements. We are doing our best to recover that money, taking the legal steps that are necessary. The money that was spent in a scandalous way based on the decisions of the former Management Board of ORLEN and also the decisions of OTS. It never happened in the history of this company to give $400 million to a small company with no security whatsoever. When Daniel Obajtek was President of the Management Board of ORLEN, we saw more than 2,000 transactions with no such cases as in OTS. It was an exception. We do our best. We do what we can.
We do hope that we'll be able to recover at least part of this money, but this will be very difficult. We have engaged world-renowned law firms, world-renowned deductive firms, as well as we have also involved the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. We will do our best to recover what is possible.
[Foreign language].
A question on fuel connections with the NATO system. You have suggested that we might have some news on that during the summer. Any comment on that? The negotiations are in progress, but with no conclusions yet. No conclusions that can be published at that point. A question on the negotiations with the gas system on the Yamal pipeline. Is the negotiation still in progress in terms of the sales of the Polish section of this pipeline? The plans for Aeropol Gas, which the plans have been published. When do you plan to implement that project? When can we see some effects?
[Foreign language]
I do not think that we can talk about high-level discussions here. I believe that after the holiday period, we will come back to more advanced or intensive negotiations. A question on the comment on the Shell versus Venture Global arbitrage. The President of Venture Global said that they had other contracts like that, including ORLEN. Any comment on that? One more question on the potential veto of the President of the Republic of Poland on the so-called Gas Storage Act. What will be your scenario for the gas market if the veto is actually announced? In terms of your first question, it's supposed to start next year, and we do not comment on other players in the market. Never. We filed an appeal in a protest in the American court. It is a different jurisdiction than the British jurisdiction that you were talking about.
In terms of the veto, we do not have any comments because there is no veto yet. If the veto is announced, we will talk about it. From your recent communications, it shows that you decided to resign from the project in terms of the purchases of polyethylene. You are interested in the port. What's the logic here? If you have no interest in the share of this company, of this project, but you want to buy a port, why? We have a huge fuel base, an LPG base nearby. This would be a very important source for us. We are talking about it.
[Foreign language] .
Two last questions, please. The first question concerning the new chemistry project. You mentioned that you were supposed to talk about it, let's say, during the year. What is the stage on the conceptualization of this project for the Olefins project? Do you have any update on that? What is the dynamic of this process?
[Foreign language].
We promised that we'd come back to this issue at the end of September. Let's discuss it during the upcoming earnings call. I believe that we will close the negotiations with the general contractor at that point. We'll come back to it. Last question, please.
[Foreign language] .
From a shareholder.
[Foreign language] .
You convened?
[Foreign language].
Shareholders meeting of Energa Group, September 4th.
[Foreign language] .
We are looking at certain changes relating to the strategy.
[Foreign language] .
We are also talking about the changes that will apply to remuneration of Energa Group Management Board.
[Foreign language] .
The politicians of the Civic Platform from this area are talking about the competencies across the Energa Group.
[Foreign language].
Are you looking at the call for Energa shares? You still consider Energa as your wholly owned company, but you only have 91% of the shares. No, what I was talking about was a different approach to the stakeholders from this region, not the politicians, but the stakeholders. The general meeting was convened because on June 5th, we changed the rules of remuneration for the management board members at ORLEN and also ORLEN Group companies by decision of the general shareholders meeting. This is why we decided to convene the general shareholders meeting at Energa. We treat Energa as part of the capital group, and we will continue to do so unless something changes.
[Foreign language] .
Thank you very much.
[Foreign language] .
For the presentation.
[Foreign language] .
And for your answers to all the questions. Thank you very much for such a great turnout and a word of gratitude for the Investor Relations Department and the PR team. You are now very welcome to meet and discuss the presentation, and we will see you next time when we meet to discuss the performance of ORLEN.