Postponements likely for Shtokman, Nord Stream
Gazprom admits that the financial crisis is affecting its operations. Experts believe the company will be forced to postpone several of its major projects, among them the Shtokman gas condensate project and the Nord Stream pipeline project.
In today’s UBS conference in Moscow, Deputy Chairman of the company’s Management Committee Andrey Kruglov said that the financial crisis is affecting the company and that revenues from exports to Europe in 2009 will drop. He confirmed that the company will try to cover parts of the losses by means of increasing domestic gas prices, Rbc.ru reports.
At the same time, Mr. Kruglov, who is head of the company’s Department for Finance and Economics, confirmed that Gazprom by the end of the year will cut debts by 25 percent and that it in 2009 will abstain from taking new credits, Oilru.com reports with reference to Rbc.ru.
In December, the company management will assemble for a crisis meeting in which a revised three-year budget will be approved taking into account “the new economic realities”, Quote.ru writes.
The revised budget will inevitably include reduces ambitions with regard to investments. Earlier this year, Gazprom leaders said the company planned 850 billion RUB investments this year, one trillion in 2009 and 1,3 trillion in year 2010. Those figures are now likely to drop significantly.
Experts believe the energy giant will be forced to put on ice a number of its planned investment projects. Aleksandr Nazarov from the Metropol investment company says to RBC that Gazprom will have to postpone several of its major new projects. Among them are both the South Stream and North Stream gas pipeline projects and the Shtokman gas field development in the Barents Sea, he argues.
