Russian gas company Novatek sees profits, sales jump in 2016

Novatek, one of Russia’s largest independent gas companies, said that full-year profits increased more than three-fold in fiscal year 2016 from a year earlier, along with a 13 per cent increase in revenue thanks to higher natural gas and liquid sales volumes.

The company on Tuesday announced that revenues for the year ending in December were Rbs533.8bn, compared to Rbs472bn a year earlier. It said the rise is “largely driven by the increase in natural gas and liquid sales volumes as well as an increase in the proportion of liquids sold in our total sales mix.”

For the year, Novatek said total production reached 537m barrels of oil equivalent, a modest step up from the 521.6m a year earlier.

Profit also jumped more than three-fold compared to fiscal 2015, Novtaek said. Profit attributable to the company’s shareholders hit Rbs257.8bn, compared with Rbs74.4bn a year ago. “The amount of profit and its dynamics were significantly impacted by the foreign exchange effect (including at the joint ventures level), as well as the effect of the disposals of interests in joint ventures,” the company said in a statement.

Overall, noramlised earnings per share came in at Rbs44.31 for the year, compared to Rbs43.87 a year earlier.