E - Eni S.p.A. (E) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript
2024-04-24 12:50:10 ET
Eni S.p.A. (E)
Q1 2024 Results Conference Call
April 24, 2024 08:00 AM ET
Company Participants
Francesco Gattei - Chief Financial Officer
Cristian Signoretto - Head of GGP
Guido Brusco - Head of Natural Resources
Stefano Ballista - Chief Executive Officer, Eni Sustainable Mobility
Adriano Alfani - Chief Executive Officer, Versalis
Aldo Napolitano – Director of Exploration
Stefano Goberti - Chief Executive Officer, Plenitude
Conference Call Participants
Josh Stone - UBS
Giacomo Romeo - Jefferies
Matt Smith - Bank of America
Alessandro Pozzi - Mediobanca
Biraj Borkhataria - Royal Bank of Canada
Henry Tarr - Berenberg
Irene Himona - Bernstein
Peter Low - Redburn Atlantic
Michele Della Vigna - Goldman Sachs
Alastair Syme - Citi
Lydia Rainforth - Barclays
Kim Fustier - HSBC
Alejandro Vigil - Santander
Massimo Bonisoli - Equita
Bertrand Hodee - Kepler Cheuvreux
Presentation
Operator
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Eni's 2024 First Quarter Results Conference Call, hosted by Mr. Francesco Gattei, Chief Financial Officer. For the duration of the call, you will be in listen-only mode. However, at the end of the call, you’ll have the opportunity to ask questions. [Operator Instructions]
I'm now handing over to your host to begin today's conference. Thank you.
Francesco Gattei
Thank you. Good afternoon, and welcome to Eni quarter one 2024 results conference call. Our first quarter is an excellent result. We have reported pro forma EBIT of €4.1 billion and cash flow from operation of €3.9 billion.
Production growth in our upstream of 5%, an excellent contribution from our transition business of Enilive and Plenitude meant that we substantially resisted the overall deterioration in this scenario. The continued excellent cash conversion and CapEx discipline also meant that balanced gearing remains comfortably within our range, despite completing on Neptune and the 2023 share buyback program in this quarter.
I will analyze our results in more detail shortly, but the slides also emphasize how busy we continue to be in actions to invest to high grade and transform our company. I wanted to highlight a few items in the year-to-date because they provide helpful context for our strategic progress.
In January, we completed the purchase of Neptune. The transaction is highly synergistic, and it has already delivered a very material value to any with significant upside in Indonesia and optionality in UK, as we will see later.
With the Neptune deal, following on from Chalmette and Novamont last year, we have concluded the phase of inorganic positioning a new platform for growth, and we enter into a different cycle characterized by the valorization of these new business lines and by the dilution of exploration discovery.
As a first step in this new phase, in March, we completed a €600 million equity investment by Energy Infrastructure Partners into Plenitude. This is an important proof point for our satellite strategy, introducing aligned capital from a variable partner, supporting the future growth of the business and confirming the value created....
Eni S.p.A. (E) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript