OMV Petrom closed in the past two years in Romania 640 wells, which were unprofitable

OMV Petrom, the largest oil company in Romania, controlled by Austria’s OMV, last year closed 290 wells with marginal impact on production, after in 2015 the company closed 350 wells, the CEO of OMV Petrom, Mariana Gheorghe, stated Thursday during a press conference. The price per barrel fell from over USD 120 in the summer of 2014 to around USD 50-55 in the recent months. “We have closed several wells, it’s a continuous process of evaluation of the profitability of each well. It depends on the capacity of each well to produce”, Gheorghe said. The company estimates an average price for the oil barrel of USD 55 in 2017, up from USD 44 last year. “For the year 2017, OMV Petrom expects the average Brent oil price to be at USD 55/bbl. The Brent-Urals spread is anticipated to slightly decrease compared to 2016”, the manager mentioned. OMV Petrom posted in 2016 a net profit of RON 1.04bn (about EUR 231mln), after losses in the previous year, amid a reduction in sales by 10%, to RON 16.25bn (EUR 3.6bn), according to the report published Thursday by the company. In 2015, OMV Petrom posted losses of RON 690mln, at a turnover of RON 18.15bn. The return to profits, despite the declining sales, is explained by the management of the company by cost cutting. Also, OMV Petrom proposes to grant, from the 2016 profit, a dividend of RON 0.015/share to shareholders. OMV Petrom’s total hydrocarbon production in Romania fell by 2% in 2016, to 60.66 million boe, compared to last year, while electricity production increased by 10%, to 2.93TWh.