Status: 10/26/2022 10:36 am
The financial distress at Germany’s largest gas importer is greater than feared. Uniper has lost billions and used up more than half of its share capital. The nationalization of the group has not yet been approved.
The Düsseldorf-based energy group Uniper expects a loss in the billions for 2022. According to preliminary figures, a net loss of 3.2 billion euros is expected in the first nine months of the financial year, the company said on Tuesday evening. In the previous year, Uniper had made a profit of 487 million euros in this period.
More than half of the share capital consumed
The billions in losses also have drastic consequences for Uniper’s balance sheet equity: In anticipation of further losses, the company “burdened equity in the double-digit billions,” said the group. As a result of this development, the loss amounts to “more than half of the company’s share capital”.
In the German Stock Corporation Act, paragraph 92, paragraph 1, it says: “If, when preparing the annual balance sheet or an interim balance sheet, or if it can be assumed at due discretion that there is a loss of half of the share capital, the management board must immediately convene the general meeting and to show her this.”
Just a formal act?
The Extraordinary General Meeting is scheduled to take place in the second half of December. Then the management wants to inform the investors about the loss and explain the situation of the company.
When asked last night, a company spokesman tried to appease: It was a formal act that came as no surprise to Uniper in the context of the current situation. “As a result of the lack of gas supplies from Russia, we continue to lose millions of euros every day through replacement procurement costs.”
Central role for natural gas supply
The gas wholesaler is a supplier to over 100 municipal utilities and large companies and thus plays a central role in Germany’s natural gas supply. Uniper has been hit hard by Russia’s delivery failures.
The group has to buy the missing quantities on the expensive spot market with high losses in order to meet its own delivery obligations, and therefore got into financial difficulties. Since government aid worth billions was not enough to provide support, the federal government decided to nationalize Uniper.
Uniper share is the biggest loser in the SDAX
However, the nationalization of the company is currently still in the approval process. Among other things, the EU Commission still has to agree. The approval of the Uniper shareholders should be obtained at an extraordinary general meeting in the second half of December 2022, the group said.
In response to the numbers in early trading, the Uniper share fell by up to 3.7 percent to EUR 3.33, making it the biggest loser in the SDAX index of small stocks. In the year to date, it has already lost more than 90 percent of its value.