Good afternoon, everyone. We were holding up at two minutes to make sure that we are already in the afternoon in Warsaw. Please welcome Mrs. Magdalena Bartoś, CFO of the ORLEN Group, for the presentation of Q2 2025 financial results. New guys who kindly join us to discuss these results. Together with us, in the room, there's Przemysław Wasilewski, Head of Strategic Finance, Marcin Piechota, and Konrad Włodarczyk. My name is Jakub Frejlich, I'm Head of Investor Relations. So without further ado, I'll pass on to Magda. Please, the floor is yours.
Thank you, Kuba. I suspect we still have some audience from London, so it still needs to be good afternoon or good morning, depending where you are. I am anyways pleased to have you all on this call for another quarterly presentation. And as previously, we will go through some general information on financials before we dive into a detailed segment conversation, and we will conclude with our views on the remainder of the year, and some summary on the outlook. But to begin with, I am very pleased to open this presentation on a strong note. The second quarter of 2025 was indeed a strong one, both financially and operationally, and proves our consistent operational excellence across the board.
In all segments, you will see some strong messages as to our operational performance. Despite the decrease in revenue, speaking about the general financial information, the group's EBITDA reached PLN 9.2 billion, a significant PLN 4.2 billion improvement year-on-year. As a group, we still operated in a much more challenging macroeconomic environment compared to last year. That particularly affected margins realized in our upstream and supply segment, downstream segment, refining and petrochemical margins as well. On the other hand, these results were supported by a better regulatory environment, specifically, thanks to the absence of the gas windfall challenge that we still recorded last year.
But that is why we consider exceeding PLN 9 billion of EBITDA in a seasonally, typically seasonally weaker quarter to be a very solid result. And on top of that, we significantly improved our cash flows due to higher operating results, but also lower working capital needs resulting from lower commodity prices. And at the end of Q2, our net debt still stood at around zero, similar to the end of the first quarter. However, this level will gradually change due to an upcoming dividend payout scheduled for the first of September and delivery of our investment roadmap. Let's move on to the next page. And here, our key message is that the results, the satisfactory EBITDA result, was driven by strong business performance across all segments, across the board, as I mentioned.
On a year-on-year basis, a significant improvement is seen in the... was recorded in the upstream and supply segment. However, and that's due to the softer regulatory background. However, it is worth emphasizing that each segment, each remaining segment, contributed to the result on an large-- on an, on an equal basis to a large extent. And this really speaks to the strength of diversified business model and resilience to seasonality. And now let's take a deeper look into operational data, operational KPIs. Comparing that operational data year-on-year, in the upstream and supply segment, gas and crude oil production decreased by 11% and 16%, respectively, and that's primarily to maintenance works performed in Norway. That's planned, especially on the Phase 3 Ormen Lange field.
On a side note here, that work has been completed, delivered, is already contributing to results in the third quarter, and was completed ahead of schedule and below the budget. Wholesale gas sales increased due to higher demand from industrial clients, and also higher volumes sold in the exchange. In the downstream segment, crude oil throughput increased while refining sales remained at a similar level. Petrochemical sales decreased, and here we faced even growing products oversupply, specifically massive imports coming from the U.S. and Asia. We'll talk about it more later on. In the energy segment, electricity production increased by 27%, and that is largely due to higher renewables capacity. Our renewables capacity, by the end of the year, will have expanded by another two point...
I'm sorry, 240 megawatts. Heat production increased by 9%, and that's primarily due to weather, specifically lower temperatures in May, and therefore, prolonged heating season. And this also had a significant impact on the gas distribution volumes. Gas distribution volumes grew by 7% increase, and 7% increase in retail gas sales. Retail fuel sales remained at a similar level compared to last year. And now, detailed look, or a deeper look, into each of our segments. We have got a summary of both operational macro and financial information for each of the segments, presented. We start with Upstream and Supply that delivered very solid performance with PLN 3.4 billion of EBITDA, an increase of PLN 4.3 billion year-on-year.
And in the second quarter, we were already in the second quarter of this year, we were already free of gas windfall charge. And in the same quarter of last year, windfall charge charged the PNL with PLN 7.7 billion. That's that basically explains the difference between the two quarters for the Polish upstream. So a significant factor as well, boosting the results in the Upstream and Supply segment, is the increase in gas quotations, gas prices, by over 10%. This was somewhat limited by a 20% drop in crude oil prices and the strengthening of Polish zloty against the US dollar and Norwegian krone. EBITDA generated from oil and gas wholesales trading amounted to almost PLN 4,400 million.
Compared to the second quarter of last year, margins on wholesale gas sales deteriorated, the spreads simply narrowed, which despite higher sales volumes, was the main reason for the decrease in that business line. Now, our focus in Upstream and Supply remains firmly on maximizing value, efficient production, and growing sales volumes. Now, moving on to Downstream. Downstream's segment EBITDA LIFO was PLN 2.2 billion, down by PLN 0.6 billion. Both, the refining and petrochemical business lines have declined, but that is primarily due to a more challenging macroeconomic environment already mentioned. The refining margins with the differential deteriorated, decreased by 13%, and petrochemical margins by a strong 21%. Unlike the previous year, there were no positive one-offs, no benefits to the results from that.
As a reminder, in the second quarter of last year, we received over PLN 400 million compensation for H-Oil unit shutdown. As mentioned before, in the refining business, we maintained sales volumes, sales volumes. However, in the petrochemicals business, we recorded a decline, and that is due to oversupply of products coming from the U.S. and China, but also disruptions at Anwil that impacted the availability of petrochemical units. The Energy segment coming next. To summarize, we see a story of expansion and efficiency here. Energy segment generated PLN 2.3 billion of EBITDA, up of PLN 0.4 billion year-on-year, and that improved results come from gas and electricity distribution largely. Those were driven by volumes growth, particularly in the gas distribution, we mentioned 12%.
There's also a significant positive contribution of conventional energy business that grew by primarily due to higher demand from the operator, from the grid operator, while the growing role of the renewables is also worth noting here. In the second quarter, our renewables generated 0.3 TWh more electricity than a year ago. Consumers and Products concludes the segment discussion. Consumers and Products segment generated PLN 2 billion of EBITDA, similar to the first quarter of 2025. And that, on a side note, that speaks to counter-cyclicality of the two components of our Consumers and Products business. The contribution of fuel and utility businesses in this quarter was almost even.
Sales and fuel, of fuels were similar to those of last year in the second quarter of 2024. We also achieved higher non-fuel margins in all markets and increased profitability in our international operations. The results of retail gas grew significantly on the back of higher market demand that's related to the already mentioned lower temperatures and prolonged heating season, but also higher demand coming from our industrial clients. Investments. In the first half of 2025, we spent almost PLN 14 billion for investments, which represented roughly 40% of our planned capital expenditure. And so, given that we expect the acceleration in the project execution, in the roadmap execution, in the second half year, we maintain our CapEx forecast of roughly PLN 35 billion, probably the 35 billion being at the top range of our expectation.
The 40% of progress at the end of the second quarter is very typical to the previous year's trajectory of delivering our annual CapEx plans. In the next two pages, we will focus on financial standing. In our strategy, you might remember in our strategic discussions, we emphasized the need for a proper approach towards financing of our investment projects and also ongoing operations. We also identified the need for responsible and effective capital allocation as one of the key pillars of our strategy.
And therefore, during the second quarter, we completed our functional financing strategy that targets ensuring financial liquidity, especially taking into account the complexity of our operations and the increasing volatility of environment, but also financing development and value growth of the group. All of which, while maintaining financial ratios at the level defined in the strategy, and let me just briefly remind you that the maximum leverage we expect or allow is probably better to say is 2.0 of net debt to EBITDA. And as a result of our policy update, in the first half of 2025, we managed to complete significant milestones.
At the very beginning of the half year, we issued bonds worth of $1.25 billion US dollar dedicated to the US market, and then towards the end of the half year, we issued green Euro bonds worth EUR 600 million, specifically dedicated to finance the energy transition. We have also successfully applied for non-refundable support to finance our hydrogen projects development, worth close to PLN 1.7 billion Polish zloty, and over PLN 1 billion of support for gas smart metering and expansion and modernization of our gas network in Poland.
Moreover, we also signed significant loan agreements with European Investment Bank of PLN 3.5 billion and a loan of up to PLN 7.6 billion with the Polish Development Bank as part of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan for our Polish audience, KPO. There is still more to come. We're working on a few very efficient, but also very exciting projects related to asset-backed loans for development projects, among others. Stay tuned, there's more on that coming up in the next quarters. And by doing this, we're building a portfolio of diversified sources of financing. We're strengthening... while strengthening also our presence in the financial markets. And now a bit more on the financials and our current financial standing.
In terms of net debt to EBITDA, we mentioned at the beginning, we stand at a very similar level, as to the one recorded for the first quarter. To be very precise, our net debt to EBITDA covenant was, minus 0.08 times, negligible. And this confirms, obviously, very good position, gives us, a very comfortable position, ahead of, ahead of the dividend payout and ahead of the second half year intensification of our strategic, roadmap delivery. At the end of the second quarter, we had PLN 5.5 billion of net cash, and we recorded in the first half, PLN 6.8 billion decrease in working capital, requirements related, to, to lower commodity prices.
In the first half year, we reduced the group's net debt by PLN 12.5 billion, and as a result of operational cash flow generation of around PLN 26 billion less the investments realized in the first half year of PLN 13 billion. And to conclude our outlook for the year for 2025 as compared to 2024, what is specifically worth mentioning and underlining at this stage is definitely a favorable environment in the refining market. We are seeing the macro environment supporting this part of our business, and we can expect that the refining margins for the year should be at a very similar level to the last year, which is significantly better than what we expected at the beginning of the year.
Regarding the remaining factors, there are no significant changes here, and we, and as such, we remain comfortable with the current consensus, analyst consensus for the EBITDA of 2025. This concludes the presentation. I will now open the floor to your questions, and we will be happy to take your questions in the Q&A session. Kuba, over to you.
Thank you, Magda. Well, I saw you already jumping in with questions. So as usual, we'll start with first come, first served. So the first one to be served is Łukasz from BOŚ. Please, Łukasz, the floor is yours. However, please limit yourself with questions up to two, then we can allow for follow-ups. That's gonna be easier to serve. Thank you.
Okay. Hello, Łukasz Prokopiuk from BOŚ. Can you hear me?
... Yeah?
Yes, we can.
Okay.
I will go.
Two, two questions on update on Venture Global. The first one on the arbitration case against Venture Global, and can you, can you give us any update, when do you expect any ruling? And can you comment on the recent losing of Shell against Venture Global in, in its arbitration? That's the first question. And the second, how much, LNG from Henry, quoted on Henry Hub do we expect this year, and how much do we expect next year? Those are the first two questions. Thank you.
Let me first start with Venture Global and the arbitration case. We indeed saw news coming about the results of Shell arbitration case. Very difficult for us to comment on that particular case and that particular verdict. Ours is expected or some news from the arbitration court is expected at the beginning of next year when the first sitting should take place. Therefore, I think we will need to simply patiently wait till the beginning of next year to reveal some more information and news about the expected outcomes. When it comes to the LNG delivery, we started receiving cargos from Calcasieu Pass. In the first half year, we received four, if I'm not mistaken. Four. Three.
All right, thank you, Marcin. But I see that Marcin has got details in front of him. So, Marcin, let me pass over to you.
Yes, thank you very much for this question. In fact, the Venture Global started its shipping at the end of April. And so, we are expecting this volumes, of course, to grow in forthcoming quarters. We are not disclosing our plan for exact volume that we are willing to receive right now. But, you have our estimations about. You have our details around about the contract that it states it is up to 2 billion cubic meters of LNG that may be delivered from Calcasieu Pass per annum. So, we expect this to be fulfilled by the Venture Global.
Okay, thank you. But can you perhaps, if you cannot give us any numbers, imports numbers, but could you please tell us how much % growth do you expect next year of imports compared to this year?
You mean only coming from Calcasieu Pass, right?
LNG based on Henry Hub, like, the Cheniere contracts, too.
Mm-hmm.
Well, in total, we assume that both of the contracts that we have for Henry Hub, starting from 2026, will be fully utilized. So therefore, it means almost 2 billion cubic meters coming from Cheniere, and 2 additional billion cubic meters coming from Venture Global, Calcasieu Pass.
Okay, but you have another $5 billion contract with Venture Global, which was supposed to be coming next year, but, that's the reason I'm asking the question: Do you expect anything from this contract?
It depends, of course, because the second part of the contract with Venture Global is from different terminal. It's Plaquemines, and we are cautious about when this contract will start, based similarly, like, in the case of Calcasieu Pass. We need to have the confirmation that the terminal will be exporting.
Well, to sum up, we have the contract valid. However, we're cautious on volume confirmation, as we have some experience that proved us to be correct in being cautious. That's, I guess, I should be summarizing this. Maybe we can move on to the second person, Tomasz.
Thank you.
Tomasz? It's you.
Yes, hello. This is Tomasz Szkurlat, Santander. Two questions. The first one is on CapEx, and I'm just wondering, what are the odds of you underspending this year versus your budget? And also, when I look at your strategy and see this CapEx figure between 43-47 is the average for 2025-2027, I was just wondering whether already right now you have the project in your pipeline that could next year lift your CapEx figure to this higher level? So this was the first one, and the second is on working capital. Second quarter was another quarter where you released quite a lot of money from your working capital. So I'm wondering, what do you expect for the second half of the year? And if you could...
Tell us more about the drivers of working capital. What was behind the release? I also remember you saying last time that you were talking about some structural actions aiming at release of cash from working capital. If you could give us an update on that one. Thank you.
Thank you, Tomasz. Let me start with CapEx and what are the odds of us on underspending on the budget. I mentioned in our CapEx page here that the PLN 35 billion is rather towards the upper range of our expectations, and there are still risks around the delivery, but more around phasing. So it might be that some parts of the CapEx. There are simply a lot of moving parts, and it might happen that some parts of our CapEx spend will shift into 2026. But we are pushing forward, and our teams are absolutely committed to deliver.
We introduced also a more flexible internally tool to reallocate CapEx from the areas that are either being delayed or unsuccessful to areas that can deploy teams to deliver new CapEx initiatives or projects like, for example, in electricity distribution. So that work is ongoing, and we strive to deliver on the 35, but whether there is a risk of some bits moving into the first quarter of 2026, there still are, and we are actively managing those risks. You also asked about projects going forward in the pipeline for 26-28, and how it compares to the strategy.
Just a quick reminder, the numbers, the figures we see in the strategy include inorganic growth as well, so we include M&A projects, not only investment in our assets, i.e., organic growth. For the investments, I think that the typical investments, let's say, I think we've got very good visibility where the priorities are, and what new projects will be added into our strategic roadmap. Those are CCGTs in Gdańsk and Grudziądz, and also preparations for the offshore wind farms going forward. As additional, we also continue on the projects that you're seeing in our roadmap today as well. When it comes to inorganic growth, there is a rich pipeline of projects.
You've probably noticed, and we're also a little bit looking forward to the next quarters, 'cause we haven't completed any significant transaction this year. But the pipeline is rich, and we hope to be able to communicate some good news in the coming quarters. So yes, that target is still in place or is still valid for us. And then, in terms of working capital, the decrease in working capital in the second quarter or in the first half year, 'cause we compare here end of quarter two versus end of 2024, was driven primarily by lower commodity prices. We do have a pipeline of initiatives that are supposed to support our working capital structurally going forward.
But still, the largest impact on our working capital will always be from gas and crude oil, specifically prices. And we expect these to. We don't see any great volatility coming. I think there is a general expectation for the gas prices to remain to remain at the current levels, or or even more pressure coming on those gas prices. Crude oil prices recorded a midterm minimum, let's say, and there is no driver that would potentially or no discussed driver that would potentially reverse that trend. Of however, the volatility has been quite significant this year as well.
During the second quarter itself, there was great volatility with tariffs announcements, with OPEC movements related to crude oil production. So a lot going on. We will observe going forward, but we don't expect any significant changes to the commodity prices that would drive some dramatic changes in the working capital needs.
Thank you.
Piotr, the floor is yours. Citi.
Good morning, everybody, or good afternoon. So I have two questions. There are some headlines discussing that you are considering your options for Energa. Can you please tell us a little bit, even briefly, what is at stake here? Like, there's press articles talking that this subsidiary wants to raise capital and put more projects into operations. There's a number of politicians talking in press also, what else they want to achieve. And you originally, I remember, ORLEN announced tender offer for 100%. So can you please tell us what options you will be briefly discussing with the advisor, as this headline suggested you hired one? And second one, could you please describe-...
Also help us understand where you stand on this Azoty PDH project, whether, I mean, you, I think, what's the latest, if you extended the term sheet or where we are?
Yeah. With regards to Energa, I think I will need to separate my answer from the public noise and focus on the facts. So the fact is, that we've got a significant energy group, a significant public energy group in Poland, that is traded on the Warsaw Stock Exchange, and there are minority shareholders that have expressed their dissatisfaction with the fact that ORLEN has got a majority stake with Energa. We tried tendering for Energa shares in the past, that was unsuccessful, and we are still ORLEN on its corporate balance sheet finances the development plan of Energa and all the major investment projects.
And we obviously need to find the best way going forward to deliver on our strategy objectives in terms of energy segment, and to support producing returns to our shareholders. So we asked a reputable advisory firms to propose solutions that we would potentially implement going forward. The reason for hiring an advisor here is that we simply want to have an independent view. We want to analyze any possible options.
So even in theory, if there is an option that is potentially feasible, we want that to be analyzed, put on the table, and then together with Energa and Energa stakeholders, decide on the future of us and where the synergies are simply to be delivered. And when it comes to Azoty PDH, you probably have noticed an announcement from Grupa Azoty that we decided not to put a binding offer and not to proceed with a share transaction. That is indeed true. However, we are still committed to the project, and we see the asset as a high-quality asset. Our interest now that we are exploring is in the logistical assets.
There is a significant energy that we can deliver to ORLEN in the port, specifically propane reloading operations. We've got a propane port, smaller port, shallow waters port in Szczecin that is very close to Police. We could deliver propane on larger vessels to Police and then deliver on synergies related to logistical costs. That is clearly an interesting option that we are discussing with Grupa Azoty that can be combined with the needs of the PDH projects and that's something we are exploring going forward.
What's going to happen with the PDH installation? Is it going to start or or?
There's enough capacity at the port to serve both purposes.
Okay. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Piotr. Anna Kiszczak, UBS.
Hi, I hope you can hear me. Thank you very much for the presentation. Several questions. First will be around the Litvínov outage, if you can provide some color on what is expected there, how fast it can be restarted, etc. And one around your estimates for the gas trading segment results in third quarter. Like, if you can provide some color of how are the trading margins looking currently? Thank you very much.
Anna, there was an outage in Czech Republic that impacted our Litvínov plant in July. We managed to restart operations in Litvínov, but when restarted to full capacity, we noticed certain disruptions in our steam cracker units. As such, we decided to... or as a result, we decided to shut down the steam cracker that puts the refinery at minimum capacity. We are currently analyzing the reasons for those disruptions, and putting a plan together in order to eliminate and repair the unit. It is definitely a matter of weeks, not days, but there is still no final solution on the... or final plan on the table.
Estimates on gas trading, just a quick reminder, we don't have a gas trading segment. We've got an upstream and supply segment that deals with supplying volumes to the markets and other segments. But I mentioned already that we have experienced narrowing spreads for the gas trading that should probably stabilize going forward, as the volatility in gas prices is also lower than the previous years. Therefore, that's probably to be expected. So, narrower spreads, but stabilized situation.
Thank you very much.
Ricardo, please. Ricardo?
Hello. Yeah, Yeah, can you hear me?
Yeah.
Sure. So first question that I have is on the olefin project. How things are going on your side, and should we continue to expect any sort of more visibility and more details, or by year end? And then the second question, it's on we've seen some announcements from China and South Korea on petchem, something on refining as well, potential capacity closure. Given how we've been seeing a challenging environment for petchems in Europe, do you think that if we go ahead and see some of those closures, that could help your margins? Or do you think it's more of a headline and nothing really changing on the fundamentals? Thank you.
I think I will start with a comment that for us, petrochemicals production is not really a standalone business. It's part of an integrated value chain. So we still benefit from petrochemicals production by increasing throughput at our refineries. And that's a critical comment, as compared to other players in the market that are announcing closures, and because they don't benefit from the integrated value chain. Whether those closures will support our margins, we surely hope so, and we expect some improvement, but we're also very cautious with those expectations. So none of our internal plans includes any optimistic expectation on the cycle trend reverse. We see structural changes in the market when it comes to feedstock.
We see structural changes in the market when it comes to capacities. Demand is also soft in Europe, therefore, we keep our expectations rather lower, and focus on operational efficiency and utilizing the integrated value chain margins. When it comes to the new olefins projects, there's been loads of work done over the past two quarters in order to prepare an integrated, an integrated plan combining the work to be delivered on the ISBL and OSBL, and discussing with our partners about the contractors, but also trading partners. We're, we've delivered on some significant milestones. The next one that we would like to communicate and discuss publicly is an updated budget, which we promise to come back to you with end of September.
We might have some struggles as discussions with the contractors are ongoing, but there is a plan to deliver on that promise and present the budget end of September.
Thank you.
Oleg Galbur, please. Your turn.
Yes. Good afternoon. I hope you can hear me well. I have two questions. The first one is regarding the recently announced asset impairments. As those impairments were triggered by the deterioration of macro assumptions for the ongoing project, could you please tell us how would these new macro expectations impact your EBITDA guidance for the downstream segment, specifically for 2027 and more importantly, for 2030, where you guide for PLN 6 billion-PLN 7 billion and PLN 10 billion-PLN 11 billion respectively? And the second question is, a follow-up on your earlier comments about the petrochemical business. I noticed that the model petchem margin has improved quite significantly in the second quarter versus the first quarter. At the same time, the segment results having improved or the loss has decreased significantly less.
I was wondering, first of all, which level or how do you see evolving the petchem margins in the short term? Second of all, what level of margins would you require in order to bring the petchem business to break even, for example, if you have some, some ideas? Thank you.
I hope I got your questions correctly, 'cause there was some bad line. But I'll start with asset impairments, and let me clarify. We've got, in our first half year, asset impairment. We've got, let's say, two groups of impairments. One related to upstream, specifically in the second quarter. Upstream got impaired, parts of upstream got impaired, due to lower realized crude oil prices. It's not really about our expectations, though, the standard requires us to recalculate when there is a potential impairment indicator, and the drop in crude oil price is such an indicator. Therefore, hence, we recalculated our results to the current prices and recorded some impairment in upstream.
On the other hand, we also reversed impairment in the upstream as due to our ongoing investment in the exploration assets, we are increasing efficiency. And that's allowed us to reverse some of the previously recorded impairments. The impairments we've got in downstream are not really driven by deteriorating macro environment. We've got two large investments, the olefins project, and bottom of the barrel, so the hydrocracking unit in Mažeikiai, in Lithuania. That simply are in the red. And as we continue delivering on those projects, we are re-evaluating the value in use. If that's lower than the spent CapEx, we simply need to write off the CapEx that we spent during the quarter.
So it's not that there is some change in our expectations related to macroeconomic environment, it's more the sense of the past, so to say, that we need to, that we need to, simply deal with on an ongoing basis. And you also asked about the model petchem margins. Those improved quarter-on-quarter, but still dropped by more than 20%, year-on-year. So we are simply in a persisting, very difficult macroeconomic environment. Those changes in, in the petrochemicals, model margins are not really due to, any, movement in the market related to prices or profitability of those, mostly related to feedstock.
So with the lower crude oil price, we've got lower naphtha prices, and that is part of our petchem margin computation, hence the increase in the petchem model margin. But the results were indeed in Q2 weaker than in Q1, because of also mentioned disruptions in the operations. We had blackouts in May at our Anwil unit or Anwil plant, and that disrupted operations and volumes produced, hence a difficult quarter for that business line to manage, to navigate through.
Thank you very much. May I just ask one confirmation for the first question? So does it mean that you see no need to revise your EBITDA guidance for the downstream segment for 2027 and 2030 as a result of the impairments that we discussed about?
We see no significant change to our strategic assumptions. Hence, of course, we will re-evaluate our strategic plans towards the end of the year, also financially, but no significant structural change to our expectations for each of the segments.
Thank you.
Michał Kozak, Trigon, please.
Hi. Do you hear me well?
Yeah.
Very well.
Okay. So two questions from my side. The first one, what is the total size of Gazprom's claims against ORLEN, and how much is it booked in your provisions? And the second question: How much do you pay for chartering LNG ships in wholesale trading? What was the CapEx amount in this sub-segment in upstream and supply in the first half of this year? And could this cost rise and hit EBITDA if imports grow in the coming years? It seems to me that there is no free cashflow in this line, in the first half of the year, due to high CapEx, due to high charters. Thank you.
Thank you. I will start with Gazprom, but Marcin, in the meantime, if you could find some more detailed information on the chartering and ships. All right. Gazprom and the recent arbitration decision, and how it's reflected in our financial statements. The arbitration decision was to revise gas sales prices to an updated formula. In essence, we simply acquired gas at lower prices. That was the decision of the court in 2018, 2019 and 2020. We recalculated all of the purchases and came up with a maximum amount of $290 million, and that is recorded as a conditional liability and included in our financial statements.
We, however, assessed in detail what is the probability of the future economic benefit outflow. We are currently unable, due to sanctions and regulations, to settle off that liability, and we don't expect that situation to change rapidly. Therefore, we procured several scenarios evaluating the probability of us having the obligation to... The obligation or actually the possibility to pay, because the obligation we have already. We came up with an accrual provision of PLN 217 million... We will reevaluate that provision each quarter, exactly evaluating what is the possibility of the future economic benefit outflow. There is a bit more to notice here, 'cause the situation with the settlements to Gazprom is quite complex.
There is another, another at least two cases that we expect in the next years. It relates to a revision of gas sales prices for 2021 and 2022 as well. One relates to interest payments. Therefore, in order to have the full picture, we will need to conclude on those remaining cases, but that first one is already reflected in the financial statements and in our books. Marcin, over to you for the ships and shipping.
Yes. Indeed, the CapEx that we have now plans for the charter of LNG carriers is over PLN 2 billion for 2020, for 2025. However, we will look into more details in reference to the forthcoming years, how this will look like, and we'll get back to you on the call.
Okay, thank you.
Krzysztof, PKO?
Hello, everyone. Krzysztof speaking. Thank you for the presentation. I only have one question, because you referred to the analyst consensus with respect to EBITDA line. However, I was wondering if you could refer also to DPS, right? Which is right now, as I'm looking at the Bloomberg terminal, 5.7 for next year. And I was wondering, after this first half, we saw the operating cash flow numbers, which is the base for calculations for the calculation of dividend, in your case. And you see, you see that there is a risk that the CapEx spend is also going to be lower than you guided. Does it mean that we could expect even, like, a higher dividend, like a total dividend next year, in 2026?
The way to respond to this question or, the way I am going to respond to the question, is evaluating. We need to, when making, the dividend decision next year, we will take into consideration operating cash flows and the quality of the operating cash flows. So far, we have been happy with the quality of operating results our segments delivered. Volumes are solid, macroeconomic environment is difficult, or more difficult than it used to be, but the macroeconomic environment in the downstream segment is supporting our business. All in all, good performance in a more stable, however, weaker environment. Then the next is the financing availability. We've done a lot of work on the financings, secured around PLN 10 billion of preferential or non-refundable financing.
We issued two rounds of bonds, one successfully reentered the U.S. dollar market and reopened the green financing in euros. We are also working on other asset-backed financing arrangements, as I mentioned. Therefore, as we stand today, it is probably going to be a tick in the box when it comes to availability of financing and the quality of our funding structure. And then, lastly, of course, the CapEx plans and the needs going forward. So far, we've delivered on the plan. There might be some delay here and there. Again, as I said, a lot of moving parts, but we see the situation under control.
As we stand today, we are on a journey towards a recommendation, dividend recommendation, that is going to be exactly in line with our dividend policy, so up to 25% of operating cash flows, less financing costs. Does that make sense?
Yeah, yeah. Thank you. Thank you very much.
Now we move on to Gustavo Campos, please.
Hello.
Hey, Gustavo.
Hi. Sorry. Yes, thank you very much for the call, and congrats on the strong results. I had yeah, just a couple of questions from my side. First of all, I'm trying to think here, what are the main drivers that are keeping petrochemical prices at you know at these trough conditions that you mentioned and into the second half of the year? If you could elaborate a bit on the macro backdrop, and if you have any visibility on the timing of any potential recovery in the industry that could support margins. Yeah, that would be my first question. Thank you.
... Look, Gustavo, margins in our prices in petrochemicals business is a play of supply and demand. What we're seeing in Europe is softer demand, and what we're seeing in Europe is an oversupply, specifically coming from imports. Of course, the situation we discussed with the previous question, so the closures of units in Europe and limiting local supply will, to some extent, soften or not really soften, ease the situation and support the prices. But whether that will be the scale that everyone expects is actually relatively hard to comment. Again, for us, as I mentioned, while we would love to benefit from an easier, softer market...
Sorry, not a softer market, but an easier market, we are still benefiting from an integrated value chain, and margins realized on both, refining and increased throughput. That's how petrochemicals contributes to our results at this stage. So what would need-
Understood, yeah
... to happen for the recovery to happen? Either demand significantly improved, will that happen with the recovery efforts for Ukraine? Will that happen with some decisions of the European Commission and changes in the European industrial landscape? Probably. But none of those, I think, is a quick fix. Or limiting supply to the European markets, that can happen with some regulatory decisions and legislation, but there is nothing on the kind of quick short-term horizon.
Understood. Thank you. That is very helpful. My second question would be around if you could please give an estimate on the percentage of your EBITDA contribution that is linked to gas prices and the oil prices, separately. That would be very helpful. Thank you.
The way we are exposed to those two commodities is highest, obviously, in the upstream and supply segment, where we produce gas and crude oil. But on the other hand, our business model includes countercyclicity, as I mentioned, and also some natural hedging. Because the same gas and crude oil is an input feedstock to production in our downstream segment. So when the prices move either way, we benefit in one segment and while we record narrower spreads in the other segment. Gas is also inputs into electricity production and drives electricity prices to some extent. So I think it's a more complex picture than just applying a percentage on EBITDA contribution, 'cause there is a contribution on both ways.
There is a contribution on realized prices on exploration, and here Upstream Poland and Upstream Norway are the key pieces of the puzzle. But there is also input on towards a significant input towards the downstream segment.
Understood. Yeah, no, that is very clear. And your gas production, as far as you know, for example, 2026, do you have any estimate of how much your gas production is hedged in by prices?
We probably would refrain from detailed discussions on our hedging policy. That's a very sensitive information. So let me leave it this way. If you could connect with the IR team, or the IR team will connect following the presentation and see how we can address that question without again putting us in a too uncomfortable situation, revealing too much about our hedges.
Understood. Yeah, apologies for that. Yeah, thank you.
Don't raise your expectation.
Sorry, lastly, I just wanted to ask about the funding needs. You said you had some asset-backed loans that you were still working on, but other than that, should we expect any additional, like, bilateral loan agreements or more issuances for the rest of this year? Or do you think that your debt funding needs are already addressed as far as 2025?
Mm-hmm.
Thank you.
Gustavo, I, we think or we work with our funding schedule or funding plan, with a much longer horizon than just funding a year. We rather try to match, our funding, to, the milestones and needs of our strategy roadmap. So it's not really about 2025 here, it's about establishing, establishing a portfolio or building a portfolio, of, tools and instruments that will allow us to fund our strategy in the midterm, at least. Hence, that's exactly why we issued bonds this year. The markets were good and allowed us to, deliver on successful transactions. We're working on some asset-backed financing.
Some transactions might be ready already this year, but here we're rather working on proper relationship and making sure that we match the funding needs to the projects, 'cause that's then a very specific financing that's not really on, that that's aimed or that's supporting a particular investment project. So again, there's a lot going on here. What we've delivered, we've already shared with you. We've got some more news coming up. Whether the projects will have finalized this year is not really that critical, but it's critical that we've got the right quality of our funding pools, the right liquidity, and the right cost.
Maybe a little bit of a comment here. Financing is an ongoing project. I mean, we're gonna be delivering on those projects constantly and instantly, on various needs, 'cause we both require long-term capital for investments, but we also require working capital for ongoing operations. So this is a summary here that we presented and Magda discussed, that actually summarizes our approach, and therefore results of this approach that have been delivered over the last six months. And, big money likes to be silent unless signed, and most probably we will align to that, going forward. So we're not, giving heads-up on that, too soon. However, we're just listing here what, what we see as a sensible and substantial strategy, strategy delivery, so aligning required cash flows and its maturity, to respective business lines or business needs that we have.
This is something that is putting a lot of working hours on us, and, giving us, the delivery of, or us helping delivery of the strategy. That... Let's put it that way. However, I would like to, with that summary, leave the floor to Tamás with the last question, and wrap up if you don't have anything against. So, Tamás, please.
Yes, thank you very much. Good afternoon. So two quick question on my side. First, on the upstream, I saw that the second quarter production volume was significantly lower than the first quarter. Was it only due to the maintenance activity, or were you losing any production? And what is your guidance actually for 2025, 2026? That would be my first question. And second question is a little bit about your distribution network, which basically brought two-third of the profit in the energy business. These WACC rates, what you mentioned, are they in line with the law, or do you see any risk that the regulator may cut them in the future? Thank you.
Tamás, in terms of upstream, and our volumes, there are two factors, that can be seen in the second quarter result. One is lower gas production volumes, and that's due to maintenance and, to some extent, investment operations as well. Specifically, the mentioned Ormen Lange Phase 3 project. It's an add-on project to an already existing exploration asset, therefore, we needed to adjust production in order to complete on that investment activity. When it comes to crude oil, which is a much less impactful part of our upstream production, we obviously see some natural depletion of resources, but that is less of a focus for us.
For us, the key focus in upstream is gas supply, and with all of our activities and the quality of the assets that we currently have in our portfolio, we've got positive outlook for the remainder of the year and the next years. Distribution and return on assets, the WACCs you're seeing are the return are the WACCs decided by the regulator or approved by the regulator that are being used to remunerate our distribution assets on the regulated asset base. Will they change in the future? Certainly. As part of the tariffs review, WACCs are being reviewed as well.
It is in the common interest of both us and other distribution operators, distribution grid operators, and the regulator to find the right remuneration on the asset base in order to expand and modernize the grid, which is one of the key priorities in terms of the Polish energy transition.
Okay, great. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you very much. It's been very, active and lively discussion, so thank you for, participating. Thank you, Magda. We'll be wrapping up. As mentioned, should you like to have any follow-ups, we are here for you. And, see you in a quarter, if not before, on the road.
Thank you so much. It was good to have you with us. Take care.