From Breakingviews - Uniper’s gory details point to bigger German bill
a 40 billion euro net loss for the first nine months of the year. The key component: a 31 billion euro hit reflecting the future costs arising from replacing curtailed Russian gas with extremely expensive alternatives.
This is way north of the 8 billion euro capital injection from the German state announced in September. Since then Berlin has scrapped a levy on Germans intended to shield energy groups from most of their future pain, replacing it with a more generalised 200 billion euro support package. The upshot for Uniper is that its balance sheet equity has sunk from 6 billion euros as of December to minus 30 billion euros.
The scale of the expanded hole explains why JPMorgan analysts reckon Uniper might need another 28 billion euros. While that’s based on a 2023 European gas price forecast at 160 euros per megawatt hour, gas for delivery in a year’s time is currently only 130 euros per MWh. Yet cold weather could worsen the situation. With Uniper de facto nationalised, the 200 billion euro backstop will soon be called on.
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