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LONDON (Alliance News) - SEPLAT Petroleum Development Co PLC on Thursday said its pretax profit fell in 2014 as the collapse in the oil price in the latter half of the year slashed more than USD100 million off its revenue, although it said it hit its production guidance for 2014 and said it expects production to grow in 2015.
The Nigerian oil company said its pretax profit fell to USD252.3 million for the year, sharply down from the USD457.5 million profit posted a year earlier.
Revenue dropped to USD775 million from USD880.2 million, as working interest production rose slightly to 30,823 barrels of oil equivalent per day from 30,600 but its average realised oil price dropped to USD97.21 per barrel from USD110.7 a year earlier.
The production volume was in line with SEPLAT's guidance of 29,000 to 33,000 barrels per day, though it noted that excluding an unexpected 40 days of downtime on third-party infrastructure, its average working interest production was 34,616 barrels of oil equivalent a day.
The company said its working interest production guidance for 2015 is 32,000 to 36,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day, with its capital expenditure guidance set at USD168 million.
The company echoed the wider trend in the oil and gas market in saying it would be allocating capital in 2015 to the projects with the most robust project economics, given the decline in oil prices in the second half of 2014 and continued low prices so far in 2015.
The company is recommending a final dividend of 0.09 US cents per share, bringing its total dividend payout to 0.15 cents. Both are maiden payouts, with SEPLAT having floated on the market in May 2014.
"Our financial results reflect the deterioration in oil price and extended periods of downtime on third party export infrastructure in 2014. Despite this we made good progress towards our long-term strategic aims. We have materially grown our reserves base, delivered full-year average daily production in line with guidance and exceeded peak rate objectives," said SEPLAT Chief Executive Austin Avuru.
"Looking ahead, in 2015 we will take a prudent approach and seek to align spend with cash flow, allocate our capital selectively and prioritise the investments that offer the highest returns. We will capitalise on opportunities to re-base our cost structure and maintain a robust capital structure, positioning SEPLAT well to benefit from any future recovery of the sector," Avuru added.
Shares in SEPLAT were up 0.4% to 128.00 pence on Thursday.
By Sam Unsted; samunsted@alliancenews.com; @SamUAtAlliance
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