Investing.com – BP (LON:BP) has said it expects to incur impairment charges worth between $1 billion to $2 billion in the fourth quarter, while upstream production at the oil-and-gas major is projected to decrease, sending London-listed shares in the firm lower on Tuesday.
In a trading update for the final three months of last year, the British company said the non-cash, post-tax charges would be attributable across all segments of the business.
Meanwhile, upstream production in the fourth quarter is tipped be lower compared to the prior quarter, with output dropping in both oil production and gas and low carbon energy. However, the latter segment is still projected to benefit from higher natural gas marker prices.
Other business and corporate underlying annual charges are also now seen at $600 million for 2024, up from a prior range of $300 million to $400 million, due to foreign exchange losses, BP said.
Analysts at RBC Capital Markets lowered their estimates for BP’s fourth-quarter net income to $1.63 billion from $1.89 billion in the wake of the announcement, citing the impact of “higher corporate costs” and “weaker realized refining margins” in addition to the one-off charges.
Meanwhile, analysts at Jefferies said the update supports the case “for incremental downside relative to consensus earnings, mainly driven by negative revisions in customers and products.”
BP is due to publish its fourth quarter and full-year earnings on February 11.
The company also noted that the date for its capital markets day, which had initially been scheduled for Feb. 11 in New York, had been pushed back to Feb. 26 and moved to London because of a planned medical procedure Chief Executive Murray Auchincloss recently underwent. Auchincloss is set to return to the office by February, BP said.
