Uniper wrote off Unipro with a loss of €4.4 billion

German energy company Uniper ended 2022 with a net loss of €19.1 billion, according to its financial reporting. At the same time, the concern announced the exclusion from the reporting of the Russian subsidiary Unipro due to the loss of control over it and the write-off of € 4.4 billion in connection with this.

A year earlier, Uniper’s net loss was €4.2 billion. The main reason for such a sharp increase in losses last year was the military conflict in Ukraine, during which Gazprom stopped Russian gas supplies to Germany through Uniper. As a result, the German company had to buy gas on the spot market at record high prices. The replacement of Russian gas has already cost Uniper €13.2 billion, and in the future the company expects another €5.9 billion in losses from the cessation of supplies by Gazprom. In addition, asset impairment and reputational losses are estimated at €3.1 billion, including a €1 billion reduction in the cost of a loan for Nord Stream 2.

Finally, Uniper statedthat has not yet received permission from the Russian authorities to sell Unipro. “On November 30, 2022, Uniper announced the decision to distance itself from its Russian division Unipro. A planned deal with a buyer from Russia is now in doubt because the necessary approval from the Russian authorities has not been received and remains in question,” the company said in a report.

Since last summer, the German authorities have provided multibillion-dollar aid packages to Uniper several times, and in September a decision was made to nationalization companies. In November Uniper filed a lawsuit to Gazprom in the International Court of Arbitration in Stockholm, demanding that the Russian company compensate it for losses due to underdelivered gas totaling €11.6 billion.

Kirill Sarkhanyants