Gazprom and E.ON have wrapped up talks on the price of Russian gas deliveries under long-term contracts, the Russian company said in a statement. Deputy CEO of Gazprom and General Director of Gazprom export Alexander Medvedev and E.ON CEO Klaus Schafer signed the agreement yesterday.
According to the German company, prices will be revised retroactively from the fourth quarter of 2010. The parties agreed that after this agreement on the price, there is no need to continue arbitration proceedings. On the back of the agreement, E.ON raised its full-year outlook for EBITDA by € 800m. According to E.ON, the “basic structure of the long-term contract hasn’t changed” and components “with an oil linkage are still in the contract”. Medvedev said that the deal would be “conceptually the same” as an earlier accord with Wingas GmbH, which six months ago agreed on a price cut of up to 10%, without an additional increase in the spot component.
Our view:
Although visibility is extremely low on PGNiG’s case, the agreement between Gazprom and EON provides a positive cross-reading for the company. Re-negotiations yielded an average 10% price discount (either applied only to the future or also retroactively). According to our estimates, a 10% discount for PGNiG could translate into a windfall gain of roughly PLN 1.3bn (some 40% of 2011 EBITDA) for 2011 and roughly PLN 1.5bn (43% of 2012F EBITDA) for 2012. Admittedly, however, the regulator would be unlikely to rest on its laurels and we have little doubt it would cut domestic tariffs significantly.