Unipetrol plans shutdowns at its facilities this year that will curb the company's profit, Reuters reported, citing Chief Executive Officer Francois Vleugels. According to him the modernization of Unipetrol's assets will require shutdowns that will take several weeks in the third quarter of this year and that will have ``a significant impact'' on profit. When excluding the effects of the shutdowns, the business of Unipetrol will improve.
Our view: We did not calculate with major shutdowns for this year, thus regard the news as negative for Unipetrol. However, only a quarter of company’s total earnings is originated from downstream and therefore even longer shutdown will not have a crucial impact on the overall profit.