Uniper : starts 2024 with a good first quarter

Uniper recorded adjusted EBITDA of €885 million in the first quarter of the 2024 financial year. Adjusted EBITDA in the prior-year period amounted to €991 million.

Effective this financial year, Uniper reports on the basis of three segments: Green Generation, Flexible Generation, and Greener Commodities. The new segmentation reflects the company's new strategic course. Adjusted EBITDA has replaced adjusted EBIT as the company's financial performance indicator.

The Green Generation segment's adjusted EBITDA of roughly €278 million was below prior-year earnings of €298 million. The nuclear energy business in Sweden benefited from a price-driven increase in earnings on successful hedging transactions and from higher output. This was more than offset by narrower margins at the hydropower business in Sweden and Germany due to lower prices.

Flexible Generation's adjusted EBITDA decreased from the prior year's €901 million to €656 million, in particular because of lower positive earnings from successful hedging transactions in the fossil portfolio due to the overall decline in prices. Lower expenses on the measurement of provisions for carbon allowances had a positive effect year-on-year, mainly because of declining prices for carbon allowances. Allowance prices had risen in the year-earlier period. Expenses on the measurement of provisions are offset by hedging transactions that will not be settled until the fourth quarter of 2024.

In the first three months of 2024, Uniper's direct Scope 1 carbon emissions resulting from the combustion of fossil fuels to generate electricity and heat amounted to 5.5 million metric tons (prior-year period: 6.3 million metric tons). This roughly 12% decline is primarily attributable to lower electricity output at some coal-fired power plants in Germany due to the comparatively unfavorable commercial market conditions for such plants.

Adjusted EBITDA at Greener Commodities improved year-on-year, but remained negative at -€13 million (prior-year period: -€242 million). Following the extraordinarily adverse performance in the first quarter of 2023, whose causes included the liquidity measures taken in 2022, the gas business made a much more positive contribution in the first quarter of 2024. The electricity trading business was unable to repeat the particularly positive prior-year earnings it generated in a volatile market environment.

Adjusted net income of €570 million in the first quarter of 2024 surpassed the prior-year figure of €458 million, in particular because of good interest earnings.

Despite an improved gross margin, IFRS net income of €477 million was, as anticipated, below prior-year net income of €6,753 billion, whose positive factors included the release of provisions for anticipated losses for gas replacement procurement as such losses were no longer foreseen.

Economic net debt at year-end 2023 was -€3,058 million. Significantly positive operating cash flow of €1,450 million gave Uniper an economic net debt of -€4,524 million at the end of the first quarter of 2024. This thus remains an economic net cash position.

Uniper affirmed its earnings forecast for the 2024 financial year. The company continues to expect its adjusted EBITDA for full-year 2024 to be in a range of €1.5 to €2 billion and adjusted net income in a range of €0.7 to €1.1 billion.