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Welcome to the OMV results January to June and Q2 2026 conference call and webcast. After the speaker's presentation there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question during the session you will need to press star 1 and 1 on your telephone. You will then hear an automated message advising your hand is raised. To withdraw your question please press star 1 1 again. Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded. At this time I would like to refer you to the disclaimer which includes our position on forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements are based on beliefs, estimates and assumptions currently held by and information currently available to OMV. By their nature, forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that will or may occur in the future and are outside the control of OMV. Therefore, recipients are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements. OMV disclaims any obligation and does not intend to update these forward-looking statements to reflect actual results, revised assumptions and expectations and future developments and events. This presentation does not contain any recommendation or invitation to buy or sell securities in OMV. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Florian Greger, Senior Vice President, Investor Relations and Sustainability. Please go ahead, Mr. Greger.

Thank you. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to OMV's earnings call for the second quarter 2026. With me on the call are OMV's CEO Alfred Stern and our CFO Reinhard Florey. Alfred and Reinhard will walk you through the highlights of the quarter and will discuss OMV's financial performance. Following the presentations, the two gentlemen are available to answer your questions. And with that, I'll hand it over to Alfred. Thank you, Florian. Ladies and gentlemen, good morning and thank you for joining us today. I'm pleased to welcome you to OMB's second quarter 2026 results conference call. The second quarter was characterized by continued geopolitical uncertainty and heightened volatility in global energy markets, which led to substantially higher prices and margins across all our businesses. While the ongoing conflict in the Middle East affected our upstream operations and refining assets in the region, our diversified portfolio and strong performance in other areas allowed us to deliver an overall very good result despite these regional challenges. Our Clean CCS operating result rose sharply to 1.7 billion euros and cash flow from operating activities grew significantly to 1.3 billion euros. When looking at the market situation, the conflict in the Middle East continued to impact global oil and LNG trade flows through the Strait of Hormuz. While these developments resulted in periods of significant volatility, Market conditions gradually stabilized toward the end of the quarter as prospects for easing tensions improved. Against this backdrop, the average Brent oil price increased to $104 per barrel, compared to $68 per barrel in the second quarter of last year. Our average realized crude oil price rose to $98 per barrel from $66 per barrel in the prior year period. Concerns regarding LNG availability continued to support European gas prices through most of the quarter. The average DHE gas price increased to €46 per MWh compared to €36 per MWh in the prior year quarter, while our realized gas price increased to €38 per MWh from €29 per MWh. Market conditions also improved substantially in our downstream businesses. European refining indicator margins more than doubled to $20.3 per barrel, compared to $8.1 per barrel in the second quarter of 2025. This was driven by tighter supply availability and growing inventories following restrictions on shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, as well as damages in the Russian energy infrastructure impacting Russian refined product exports. In chemicals, European ethylene indicator margins grew by almost 40% to 813 euros per ton, while propylene indicator margins increased by more than 50% to 704 euros per ton. With that, let me now turn to the financial highlights of the quarter. Supported by a much stronger market environment and reliable operations across energy, fuels, and chemicals, OMV delivered a substantially better performance compared to the prior year period. This quarter also marks the first reporting period of the new global polyolefins leader, Barouch International, which we co-own with Atnox International Investment Arm, XRG, each party holding 50% and consolidated at equity. The contribution from Porouge International to OMV's result was very meaningful as it was able to capture the favorable market conditions across the key regions. In energy, hydrocarbon production came in lower than the prior year quarter, mostly because the Middle East conflict impacted output. In fuels, the utilization rate of the refineries improved by 7 percentage points and sales volumes were almost at the strong prior year level. In chemicals, the steam cracker utilization rate rose by 11 percentage points year on year, reflecting significantly higher utilization at Burghausen and underlining our ability to capitalize on the improved olefin margin environment. Our clean CCS operating result increased sharply by 65% to 1.7 billion euros. This is especially noteworthy because in chemicals, a large part of the results stemmed from the equity-consolidated Barouch International and is therefore already an after-tax figure. Consequently, OMV's net income surged to around 930 million euros, an increase of more than 500 million euros year on year. The clean tax rate decreased from 45% to 34% because of a different earnings mix. A higher share from fuels, which is typically lower taxed, and the substantial equity results from Boruch International. Because of this, clean CCS earnings per share went up sharply to 2 euros and 90 cents. compared to 1 euro and 20 cents last year. Cash flow from operating activities rose by around 250 million euros to 1.3 billion euros reflecting both the stronger earnings and the net working capital inflow of around 150 million euros. The clean operating result of energy rose strongly year on year by 50% to 885 million euros. Driven by an improved EMP result, higher hydrocarbon prices led to positive market effects of more than 400 million euros. Reduced sales volumes, mainly due to the conflict in the Middle East, were somewhat offsetting. The realized crude oil price increased by 48% to an average of $98 per barrel, while Brent increased by 53% to $104 per barrel. Different pricing mechanisms, which in some countries have a delay of two months, explain the slight difference. OMV's average realized natural gas price improved by 30% to €38 per MWh. The stronger increase compared to the European benchmark price DHE, which grew by 26%, was mainly due to portfolio composition. Hydrocarbon production remained broadly resilient at 291,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day, declining by only 4% despite temporary lower production driven by the Middle East conflict. Strong operational performance in Libya, where production increased by 10,000 to 45,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day, supported by new wells, helped to offset natural decline in countries such as Norway and New Zealand. Absolute production costs decreased because of various cost reduction measures. However, unit production costs rose slightly to $11.2 per barrel. This increase resulted mainly from lower production volumes and unfavorable exchange rate effects. Sales volumes declined more than production by 34,000 to 242,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day as we had no listings in the Middle East because of the conflict. Partly compensating were higher sales in Libya and Norway due to increased production and the listing schedule. The gas marketing and power result improved by 11 million euros to 6 million euros, driven by a higher contribution from GasWest which was mainly attributable to the release of a transport provision related to booked pipeline capacities. Gas East came in broadly in line with the prior year quarter. The power business was impacted by the planned yearly maintenance turnaround of the Plas power plant which usually takes place in the second quarter. I'm now pleased to give you an update on the significant progress of the Neptune Deep project, one of the most important energy developments in Romania and the Black Sea region. With the installation of the Neptune Alpha offshore production platform in the Black Sea, OMV Petrom has now reached another important milestone. The platform, located in waters approximately 120 meters deep, is weighing more than 16,500 tons and standing over 225 meters high, which makes it one of the most impressive offshore structures in the region. Neptune Alpha will serve as the operational core of the field, processing natural gas offshore before transferring it to the onshore network. It has been designed as a fully automated facility capable of remote operation, reflecting the latest advances in offshore technology. The installation was successfully completed using the Saipem 7000, the world's third largest semi-submersible crane vessel. In parallel, the installation of the offshore main gas pipeline, which will connect the field's production facilities The next phase of the project is now well underway. as progress is being made toward completion of the remaining production wells and the installation and integration of the subsea infrastructure at the Domino and Pelikan South fields. In parallel, preparations are progressing well to connect all offshore facilities to the transport pipeline system. This will be followed by a comprehensive testing and commissioning program to ensure safe and reliable operations. The progress achieved to date is a testament to OMV Petrom's commitment to delivering this strategic project safely, efficiently, and on schedule. The Neptune Deep project remains on schedule for first gas production in 2027, thanks to the dedication of everyone involved. Once operational, it will play a vital role in strengthening Romania's energy security, supporting regional supply resilience, and reducing Europe's dependence on imported natural gas. The Clean CCS operating result of fuels rose sharply to 446 million euros. mainly due to substantially stronger refining indicator margins. In addition, the refining business benefited from a more favorable production mix and higher utilization. The trading business also delivered a strong performance, taking advantage of the high market volatility during the quarter. Partially offsetting were the impacts of elevated crude differentials and temporary regulatory measures, especially in Romania and Austria. The European refining indicator margin is increased by more than $12 per barrel to $20 per barrel, with refining utilization reaching 90%. compared to 83% in the prior year quarter, which was affected by planned shutdowns at Burghausen and Petrobras, we were well positioned to capture these favorable market conditions. The contribution from the marketing business declined as the retail performance was affected by lower fuel unit margins caused by price regulations in several countries. This was partly offset by a stronger non-fuel business contribution and sales to EV customers, which tripled compared to the same period last year. The commercial business result remained at a similar level to the prior year quarter. The result of ad-hoc refining and ad-hoc global trading came in slightly negative due to supply chain disruptions as a result of the conflict in the Middle East. The clean operating result of chemicals more than doubled to 429 million euros, driven by substantial increases in olefin and polyolefin prices. Barouch International, in its first quarter of existence, delivered a strong performance and represented the lion's share of the chemical result. This is quite remarkable, as we only show OMV's share of clean net income. thus an after-tax number as the new company is consolidated at equity. The result of OMV-based chemicals also increased strongly mainly because of substantially higher or less in indicator margins which resulted in a positive market effect of 100 million euros. Elevated price levels led to higher absolute discounts which partially offset the overall increase. The utilization rate of the OMV steam crackers improved by 11 percentage points, following substantially better utilization at Burghausen. Utilization in the prior year quarter was impacted by the shutdown of the crude distillation unit at the Burghausen refinery, as well as turnarounds at customers. At 349 million euros, the contribution from Boruch International was strong. All these attributable sales volumes from Perugia International, which corresponds to 50% of the new company, totaled 1.17 million tons. As this was the first full quarter of operations of Perugia International, I would like to provide you with some further details. Formed by OMV and XRG at the end of March 2026, through the combination of Borealis and Porouge and the acquisition of Nova Chemicals, this new global leader in polyolefins has got off to an extremely strong start. Porouge International delivered strong results within the first three months of acting as one group. Adjusted EBITDA reached $1.8 billion in the second quarter of 2026, thus more than double the pro forma adjusted EBITDA generated in the first quarter of this year. At 33%, the EBITDA margin in the second quarter was very strong. The new company has proven the benefit of its diversified global footprint and premium product portfolio in this extremely challenging market environment While the conflict in the Middle East Severely constrained global polyolefin availability and drove prices up by more than 50% in North America and Europe and over 30% in Asia. It also highlighted the flexibility and resilience of the Boruche international global asset base. Boruche international assets in North America and Europe continued to operate at high utilization rates. with unrestricted access to feedstock and logistics services. In the Middle East, production volumes, as reported by Paroosh PLC, were impacted by asset damage resulting from the incident on the 5th of April, reducing utilization in the second quarter to 60%. Baruch PLC acted swiftly to complete the necessary repairs and restore full asset availability by the end of June. With asset availability now fully restored, Baruch PLC is well positioned to return to high utilization rates subject to logistics and feedstock availability. Despite the operational challenges in the Middle East, Porouge International has also made significant progress in integrating its business under a new governance and management structure. A series of value creation initiatives was launched with a focus on maximizing cost advantages and leveraging the group's differentiated high-performance product portfolio. These actions lay the foundation for the estimated EBITDA synergies of over $500 million, with approximately 75% to be realized within the first three years. Thank you very much for your attention. I will now hand over to Reinhard.

Thank you very much. As Alfred explained, Bruges International delivered strong financial results. As part of our ongoing efforts to enhance transparency and facilitate a deeper understanding of our financial performance, also with regard to Borussia International, I would like to provide an illustrative reconciliation bridge from EBTA to net income. We currently anticipate an indicative depreciation of around $2 billion per year, reflecting the size and capital intensity of the Borussia International asset base. The indicative combined corporate tax rate of the new company is expected to be between 25% and 30% per year. As previously emphasized by Alfred, Borussia International achieved a strong performance in the second quarter, recording adjusted EBITDA of $1.8 billion. Adjusted EBITDA is stated before non-recurring expenses, which amounted to around $150 million as a one-time effect in the second quarter of 2026. When reconciling to adjusted net income, approximately $500 million reflect depreciation, while the remainder of the difference is being nearly equally split between interest and tax expenses. To bridge the adjusted net income of around $900 million to the contribution to OMV's clean operating resulting chemicals, one must first deduct the 10% minority share of Boruch PLC, then consider OMV's 50% stake in Boruch International, account for the FX impact from dollar to euro conversion, and include PPA adjustments. We trust that this information provides greater transparency on how Bohus International translates into OMV's share of results. With that, let us move back to OMV and from earnings to cash flow. Our cash flow continues to reflect the strong operational performance and cash generation of the OMV businesses. Our second quarter operating cash flow before networking capital effects rose substantially by 39% to almost 1.2 billion euros, mainly due to higher commodity prices and stronger refining margins. This was achieved despite the missing cash flow contribution from the Borealis Group following the deconsolidation as a result of the closing of the Bruges international transaction in March 2026. as well as lower dividends received in the second quarter of 2026. The prior year quarter still included around 200 million euros dividend payments from Boruch PLC, which is now part of Boruch International. Networking capital effects in the quarter were positive and amounted to around 150 million euros. As a result, cash flow from operating activities came in at around 1.3 billion euros, an increase of roughly 20% compared with the same quarter in 2025. As part of investing cash flow, we recorded a cash outflow of around 750 million euros in the second quarter. The prior year quarter was slightly positive as it included around 450 million euros from the divestment of our 5% stake in GASA concession in the UAE and around 650 million euros from a loan repayment from Baystar in the US. Organic, the free cash flow before dividends increased to more than 600 million euros from 160 million euros in the prior year quarter. As usual, the second quarter reflects the payment of our annual dividends, along with the dividends to minority shareholders in OMV Petron, resulting in negative free cash flow for the quarter. Looking at the half-year picture, cash flow from operating activities before net working capital effect rose by 27% to 2.8 billion euros, This increase was mainly due to a higher reported result in the fuel segment supported by strong refining margins. The missing Borealis Group cash flow contribution and lower dividends received from equity accounted investments were partly offsetting. In the first half of 2026, we recorded a build of networking capital of almost 700 million euros because of higher inventory levels in fuels and the higher price environment. In the respective prior year period, we recorded a networking capital release of around 250 million euros, mainly due to a decrease in inventories in the gas business. Organic cash flow from investing activities in the first half of the year was around 1.6 billion euros related to ordinary ongoing business investment and major growth projects such as the Neptune Deep mega project in the Black Sea, the South HBO plant in Romania, and green hydrogen in Austria. Inorganic cash flow from investing activities in the first half of the year contained outflows of around 2 billion euros in relation to the formation of Borussia International, stemming mostly from a capital injection from OMB in Borussia International and cash disposed due to the loss of control of the Borealis Group. Organic free cash flow before dividends in the first half of 2026 came in at around 500 million euros. As you can see, our balance sheet remains strong. In the first quarter, we reflected the deconsolidation of Borealis, the related changes in equity and net debt, and the 1.5 billion euros capital injection into Borussia International. In June, we shared the success of our business by distributing a total 1.7 billion euro, comprising annual dividends from two OMV shareholders, as well as dividends to minority holders in OMV Petron, thereby continuing our track record of attractive shareholder returns. Even after this sizable distribution, our leverage ratio increased to 19% only, remaining comfortably below our mid and long-term threshold of 30%. This underlines our disciplined approach to maintaining a robust capital structure while delivering attractive returns. At the end of June, OMV had a cash position of 3 billion euros and 3.1 billion euros in undrawn committed credit facilities. Let me now conclude with an updated outlook for this year. Pure political developments in the Middle East remained dynamic throughout the second quarter. While we saw alternating phases of diplomatic engagement and heightened regional tensions, Recent escalations again caused increased volatility in global energy markets. We continue to monitor the situation, but how this conflict will develop and its implication on global markets remain highly uncertain. We continue to forecast an average dated Brent price between $85 and $95 per barrel for 2026, reflecting the ongoing high volatility and limited visibility. The average TAG gas price is now estimated to be around 50 euros per megawatt hour, mirroring the current fragile state of the gas market. Consequently, we expect our average realized gas price to be around 40 euros per megawatt hour. In energy, we continue to expect average oil and gas production for 2026 to be between 280,000 and 290,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day. While we saw strong production in the first half of this year, the timing and extent of the lifting of restrictions on shipping through the trade of hormones continues to be a decisive factor. In fuels, we revise our refining indicator margin, which is now projected to be average $20 per barrel throughout 2026, reflecting an extraordinary situation in global refining markets. Refining balances have substantially tightened with around 10% of global capacity currently offline. We forecast utilization rate of our European refineries to be above 90%, with no major maintenance turnaround scheduled in the second half of the year, which will allow us to strongly benefit from the current market environment. Total fuel sales volumes are expected to be higher than last year, while retail and commercial margins are projected to be below the levels seen in 2025. In chemicals, the combination of the exceptionally strong second quarter and the continued high price environment moving into the second half of 2026 lead to a substantial improved view on olefin margins for 2026. We now expect the ethylene indicator margin to be above €600 per ton and the propylene indicator margins above €500 per ton. The utilization rate of the OMV olefin trackers is now predicted to be between 85 and 90 percent in 2026, following a weaker than anticipated second quarter. In the second half of 2026, we expect a significantly improved and stronger cracker utilization compared to the first half year. The clean tax rate for the full year is currently expected to be in the low 40s. Before we go to your questions, I would like to take a moment on behalf of the Executive Board and the OMV team. Alfred, this is your last quarterly results call as CEO of OMV, and I would like to thank you for your leadership, your clear strategic direction, and your strong commitment to OMV's transformation. Over the past years, you have guided OMV through a period of major change and important strategic decisions. You have helped position the company for the future with a stronger portfolio, a clear transformation agenda, and a continued focus on value creation for our shareholders. It has been a pleasure to work with you, and I'm sure many on this call will join me in thanking you for the open and constructive dialogue you have had with the capital markets. With that, Alfred, I would like to hand over to you for a few final words.

Thank you Reinhard, that is very nice of you and thank you for your kind words, much appreciated. And also thank you to everyone on the call. I have to say I very much appreciated the discussions with analysts and investors over the past years in our quarterly calls, in meetings and during roadshows. Your questions were always detailed, sometimes challenging and very valuable. Personally, I have to say I tremendously enjoyed all the calls, all the discussions because each time I learned a lot through your questions and challenges. It has been a privilege to represent OMV during such an important phase of its development and I'm proud of what the team here at OMV has achieved and confident about the company's future. OMV has strong foundations, a clear strategy, and many opportunities ahead. And of course, I wish Emma Delaney, Reinhard, the executive board, and the entire OMV team every success for the next chapter. And I would like to thank all of you for your continued interest in OMV and for the professional exchange over the last years. I want to wish everybody the best but we still get to the questions and we do that by me handing over to Florian. Florian Greger Thank you both. Let's now come to your questions and as always I'd like to limit your questions to only two at a time so that we can take as many questions as possible and you can of course always rejoin the queue for a follow-up question. The first question today comes from Alejandro Vigil Santander.

Yes, good morning. Thank you for taking my questions and wishing Alfred all the best in the new challenges and best of luck to Emma in her new role in the company. My first question is about the dividend from BGI. When are you expecting to collect this dividend and If considering the market performance, the company results are probably above expectations, is there any option of VGI to pay dividends in line with the initial idea of $1 billion per year? And the second question is about the net debt and your expectations for the end of the year. I saw that you issued Thank you Alejandro for your questions.

Let me start with your questions on dividend. First of all, regarding the delivery of the dividend that was announced, we are actually expecting that this dividend will come in in the third quarter and then also for the first time contribute with a very strong cash flow from Bruges International in our accounts. Regarding the second part of that question, whether we see any kind of upside to that, I think it's a little bit too early to comment on that because you're right second quarter was a very strong quarter we still have lots of uncertainties around there we have lots of networking capital challenges still with high prices high inventories and we have been also exposed to some additional capex It's too early to comment on that, and therefore I leave that for a later consideration. But at the moment, we are looking forward for still a very strong dividend contribution for Q3. Your second question on the net debt level. First of all, let me comment on the hybrid bond. The hybrid bond that was successfully placed in Q2 with $750 million is actually a replacement for a hybrid bond that we pay back and that we have announced to do in the third quarter. So we are not actually increasing the outstanding financing in that respect. So therefore, if I look at the current expenses that we had, very strong negative impacts on cash flows on the 1.5 billion equalization payment for Bruges International in the first quarter. and 1.7 billion of dividends for OMV and minorities of Petrom in the second quarter. All that will not happen in Q3 and Q4, so therefore I would expect some positive development in that respect, and that will also influence our net debt going forward.

Just to clarify for a while on the question of the hybrids, So the total hybrids you're expecting to end the year, it's the current level you have in the first half? You're not going to have a new majority?

The level is about 2 billion in total, and now we have a little bit of an elevated situation in Q2 that will correct in Q3 and will end the year with that exposure of around 2 billion.

2 billion, okay, understood. Thank you. Danke.

Impressive German, Alejandro. Thanks for your question. We now move to Ram Kamat Barclays.

Hello, good morning. Alfred, I want to congratulate you on your tenure at OMB and wish you all the very best for the next chapter. A couple of questions from me. Firstly, could you provide some color on chemicals price momentum into second half, particularly given recent pullback in monomer prices? I see that you have guided, I mean, the indicator margin suggests 150 euro per ton on an average. But if we imply, after considering the first half prices, 2Q has been significantly higher, right? So is it suggesting that second half would be lower than the annual guide that you have? And given the higher prices of these olefins, would you see that reflection of that in higher fish stock cost on polyolefin production in the second half? And just on the refining thing as a second question, I know, I mean, refining margin has been robust so far this year. Do you see any downside risk to this refining outlook? And just to get a sense... Hello, sorry, I think I lost. Just to get... No, we can still hear you. Okay. Could you provide some color on basically the relative contribution from refining and the marketing just for the modeling purpose and possibly the impact of regulatory measures introduced in Romania and Austria in the second quarter? Thank you.

Okay. Well, first of all, thank you very much for your kind words. Much appreciated. And let me try and answer your two questions. First on the chemicals margins, olefins margins, and color on that for the second half of the year. What we have actually seen here in July is that yes compared to the second quarter the prices or the margins have come down a little bit but we are still on a very strong level well above The guidance that we have provided so ethylene margins are above the 600, propylene margins are above the 500 that we are guiding for the full year. Quite honestly I think it will depend a little bit how we see things evolving as Reinhard explained a lot of volatility in the situation and how to supply the markets. We expect that we can run our assets in the second half of the year full and that we can benefit of a market environment and use this global position in Borussia International but also the European position of our OMV-based chemical crackers. On the refining margins, to be honest, Ram, I will be very careful. In the last couple of years, this was the one indicator where we were the most off all the time. It is a very special environment, and I would say some major contributing factors, of course, The Middle East crisis, not just with the Strait of Hormuz, but now also with the activities, blockage of the Houthis and the Red Sea is creating supply chain disruptions. But on top of that, A lot of the Russian infrastructure is damaged also showing limited availability and with this supply chain streams changing. I think, and at the same time, what we see is, as you could see in our retail area, good demand and also on the commercial business-to-business side only more or less flat with a very slight reduction versus last year. So we see good demand and on the other side globally major supply chain disruptions with significant capacity not accessible. This is why we take the refining indicator margin for the full year average up to 20 and we believe as we have no turnarounds and everything we will of course maximize our production from our assets. Maybe the one thing that I should mention, what we can see of course also globally is inventory levels reducing and partly compensating now for lack of supply. The longer this takes, the more Regulatory measures hard to predict because the fuel prices now across many countries in Europe in particular again significantly elevated and here this is providing for some inflationary push and one should expect that there could be some further regulatory measures. In Romania, they have announced something that they haven't published yet, so we are not completely clear, but I think it's similar to what we had in second quarter. and also in Austria here they are extending the measures however without any margin restriction. So basically we see that this should continue to provide a good environment to operate in. Thank you Ram for your questions. We now move to Eva Xenios from BNP Paribas. Eva, please go ahead with your question.

Hi, thanks for taking my questions. So just two from me, please. The first is on windfall taxes. So given that Portugal has just approved a windfall tax on oil firms, should we expect Austria to do the same? And secondly, on Nova Chemicals, could you update us on the AS2 growth project and the efficiency program, given that these are both, I think you've said, supposed to be key drivers for Bruges International's EBITDA growth this year? Thanks a lot. Thanks.

Yeah, Eva, thank you. I'll take your first question on windfall taxes. It is true that there are considerations in some countries around reintroduction of windfall taxes. We have not seen that this is a really widespread attempt. We are seeing that some of the regulatory topics regarding fuel margins have been considered. We have seen part of that in Austria, but as Alfred mentioned, not as a direct impact to reduce margins. However, we are expecting that in Romania, maybe in other Central Eastern European countries, we see similar measures. But this is not directly a windfall tax in that sense what we have experienced in the past. and therefore I would be, I would say, positive towards a continued positive environment for our business without major restrictions through windfall tax impact.

Okay, and I will try on the NOVA Chemicals AST2. Maybe let me just position it this way. As you point out, AST2 is one of the growth projects that we have there in this environment now with limited supplies globally. This is one of the areas where Borussia International can benefit off. To my understanding, they are on track with the project. However, for the detailed things, I will refer to Borussia International, but all I know is they are on track with the project.

Okay, thank you very much.

Thank you, Eva. Now we'll come to Josh Stone from UBS.

and best of luck Alfred and congratulations for managing OMV through a number of landmark moments for the company so it was much appreciated. A couple of questions one on refining I just wanted to follow up in terms of your confidence and ability to capture these very strong margins so what are you seeing today and just to confirm there aren't any hedges or anything like that that could disturb things on the refining side and then related to that there have been a number of reports in recent weeks around very low water levels on certain choke points on the Rhine and also the Danube so I'm just curious how is that impacting your business and are you already starting to see some premiums to refining or even on chemicals as a result of these very low water levels? I'm curious on that. Thanks.

Yeah, Josh, maybe first let me thank you for your kind words. Thank you very much. Then I start with refining margins a bit and maybe Reinhard wants to add something on hedging or other things. Indeed, as you said, if you look at the July We are well above the $20 per barrel that we are now giving as an outlook for the full year. I think all that is a mixed effect of all these supply chain issues. I mentioned some of them before. You added some others on logistics, transportation, low water levels are an issue and they are driving the possibility to transport the things on top of low water levels. There's also some rail issues in Germany. So all this is limiting the supply chains and I think this is what is causing the fuel prices and in particular the middle distillate prices to be where they are. And as I said, I think we are well that we have predicted for the full year. Maybe one other comment on the kerosene, because I think we are in a special situation here with OMV. As you know, we have both pipeline into Schwechat Airport here in Vienna and to the Munich Airport in Germany, also close to the airport in Bucharest. and we manage in particular here in Austria and in Germany to supply fully the kerosene demand and ensure that we can supply that and also use the demand price environment that we see.

And maybe Josh on the topic of hedges. We are not expecting any major negative or other effects from hedging going forward. Remember that the negative hedging impact that we showed in Q2 was actually triggered by a cargo from our oil trading that was designed to come from Middle East. and suddenly this cargo couldn't leave the port and therefore we had one leg open and prices were rising and therefore we encountered a loss. That is currently not the case. We do not have any cargoes that we have inside the Strait of Hormuz. We don't have any open edges on that. So therefore I'm not expecting any of the negative effects to continue.

Very good, thank you.

Thank you for the questions and we now move to Guy Levy from Morgan Stanley. Guy, please go ahead with your questions.

Hi, good morning everyone. Alfred, also echoing my colleagues here, I wanted to wish you all the best on your next steps. Perhaps the first question to you, I would like to ask you what you think are going to be the biggest challenges to the next CEO, what the next CEO is going to face over the coming years, any particular issue that you would like to have addressed If you had stayed in the company for longer as CEO. And then second one going to the working capital topic. Could you help me quantify how much of the working capital build in the first half has been driven by price versus volumes? and how should I think about that reversing over the coming quarters. Thank you.

Jaakki, thank you very much. Let me thank you very much for your kind words and then let me address your first question for the networking capital. I will ask Reinhard to help here. The biggest challenge is right, you know, I think what we have started off here at OMV, we wanted to develop the company to become an integrated Energy, Fuels and Chemicals Company. And because we believe in that integrated business model, it has served us well and over the quarters that I was here, I could see that we were able to deliver very good cash flows through this model, which allowed us to pay attractive dividends and at the same time make investments into the progress of the company. We have made some major steps in that direction. Borussia International, of course, is a big one. And it's great that the second quarter was an extremely good start for Borussia International in a special environment. And also we reported on Neptune Deep. and as we reported earlier Neptune Deep when it goes on stream it will deliver about 500 million additional operating result and in that it's a key project to keep moving forward. So Reinhard reported on our leverage ratio of 19%, which makes a very solid balance sheet that allows to continue to invest into the growth and into the transformation of the company. And I think around those things we will see most of the challenges and not to neglect, in my opinion, The high volatility that we see all around us. This requires agility. We have put a lot of work into OMV to be able to respond to this, but this will continue to be a challenge. Just the speed and volatility of changes that we see is incredible. And last but not least, I want to mention our efficiency program where we said at the minimum we want to deliver 500 million additional cash flow by 2027 as you know we have strengthened that program with a fixed cost program that should also deliver 400 million lower fixed costs by 2027 we are well on the way we have projectized all this and continuing to deliver on this will be key to make OMV a stronger and better company.

Let me look a little bit at the working capital developments and expectations. Maybe just to recap the numbers. In quarter one, we had a buildup of net working capital quite massively in the magnitude of 848 million. In the second quarter, we had a still relatively small release of 158 million. Now, mainly that of course is driven by a significantly higher pricing environment that we see. But we also see some impacts from that situation as Alfred has described it on the gas storage side. So therefore my expectation is that actually we would see with our guidance that we have given on pricing levels that probably not all of the net result of around 700 million working capital build up can be released until end of this year. It depends very much on how the quarter four ultimately will turn out and that is too early to anticipate. but my hypothesis at the moment from our liquidity point of view is we will see some of that working capital flowing back with some positive cash flows but I do not foresee the entirety of the currently positive balance or built up balance to normalize at the end of the year.

Perfect. Thank you so much.

Thank you and we now move to Sassi Chilukuo from Jefferies.

Hi, good morning and thanks for taking my questions and I wish you all the very best for the future, Alfred. I had two questions. The first one was related to Buruj International, more so with the current balance sheet strength of BGI. I just wanted to understand your latest views here. You previously highlighted the requirement to maintain BGI's investment grade rating. Now both S&P and Fitch have issued strong investment grade ratings and 2Q has been a strong quarter as well. Do you think OMV as a 50% shareholder would be required to do anything more here to support the investment grade rating for BGI? The second question was related to the dividend policy. If the dividends from BGI were not changed for this year, the temporary deduction stays in place. I was just wondering if you could tweak your dividend policy for 2026, going above 30% operating cash flow, excluding BGI dividends. to compensate for this temporary downward adjustment in BGI dividends and also reflect the elevated macro environment.

Yeah, thank you, Sassi. Let me take these questions one by one. First of all, as you mentioned, Perugia International has come out of this transaction with a strong balance sheet. and this is reflected by very strong investor credit ratings that they have received. And we are seeing that in spite of, of course, burdens from the Middle East crisis on the Boruche side, we are seeing very strong performances on NOVA and Borealis parts. now giving an overall clear upside in the situation of Bruges International. Of course in Networking Capital we also see significant impacts but this is for me still a little bit like a savings account which will come back at some stage when we will see a normalization of the situation. But this group has now demonstrated its huge resilience and the benefits of this really worldwide footprint that they have in the markets. So therefore, I'm not expecting that OMV will be required to do more if you point to any kind of capital injections or something like that. I trust that this development will lead to what was the original plan, that there will be a listing of Borussia International. There will be a capital increase. coming with that even further strengthen the balance sheet, but I also believe that this year is a positive year also regarding the cash generation and the profitability of this company. And your second question was on OMV and the general dividend turnout. Now, I think we have demonstrated in 2026 for the last year that we are willing to position the dividend payments clearly in the upper range of our 20% to 30% range of our operating cash flow. And while I do not think that changing our dividend policy to something above this 30% makes sense, Our effort is to increase the operating cash flow, which is the basis of the dividend payments. And if we are successful in that, there will be a more than adequate reward to the shareholders from our view.

Very clear. Thank you.

Thanks, Sassi. As we have quite a few people in the queue still and we have a hard stop today, I would ask you, if possible, to limit your questions to only one. And now Oleg Gabur from OdoBHF would be the next.

Hello, can you hear me?

Yes, we can.

Yes. Good afternoon and thank you for the opportunity to ask a question. And before that, Mr. Stern, I wish you all the best in your future endeavors. So we're choosing between two questions. Let me ask a question about the fuel segment. So you highlighted strong indicator refining margins at around $20 per barrel in Q2, but also referred to elevated crude differentials as a headwind. So could you help us understand How the discount of the crude slate processed by O&V evolved relative to Brent during the quarter? And also, how should we think about the gap between the indicator margin and the effective margin captured by the refining in Q2 versus previous quarters? Thank you.

Oleg, happy to give it a try with all the uncertainties ahead that we have. First of all, you're right that in the beginning of all these difficult situations around the fuel markets, Not only from the Middle East, but also from the situation with destroyed assets and destroyed refineries in the Ukraine and Russia region. The general margins went up significantly. However, the middle situation has led to temporary crude differential increases because it was unclear to what degree other countries in the region with comparable qualities can make up for the volumes that did not come through the Strait of Hormuz. At the moment, what we see is that these crude differentials have come down. and we are not seeing such a burden there so I would assume that also the gap between indicator margin and realized margin normalizes again and this is the situation as we see Q3 going forward. However, you can see that there are surprises or negative surprises not to be excluded and therefore it is hard to give a firm prediction on that.

Thank you very much. Thanks, Oleg. We now come to Henry Tarr from Berenberg.

Hi, and thanks for taking my question. I'll restrict myself to a quick one. Just on Neptune Deep, I guess we're half the way through 2026 now. In terms of timing, I know you probably don't want to limit yourself to a specific quarter or month, but should we be thinking that Neptune Deep contributes meaningfully in 2027? Or from a modeling perspective, should we think about it sort of really ramping up in 28? Thank you.

Thank you, Henry, for the question. So as I described, we are making good progress. We are on plan. We are meeting major milestones. The Neptune Alpha, the subsea pipeline, the six wells out of ten. So we keep moving ahead according to plan. What we did say is 2027 we will start up. Please do give us a little bit more time to firm down the start-up date completely. We do not want to over-promise on this despite the fact that we are making good progress. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Henry. And next is Matt Lofting from J.P. Morgan.

Hi, thanks for taking the questions. I just wanted to follow up on the comments you made earlier on your chemicals outlook for the rest of the year. I think you mentioned earlier that July margins are perhaps a bit lower than the second quarter but above the baseline implied by your updated full year guidance. Clearly conditions are quite uncertain but Is your base case that margins are likely to further ease from July levels or do you see your guidance as deliberately cautious? Just trying to understand sort of where you see the risk award around that gap, at least as it stands today. Thank you.

Yeah, thank you, Matt. I would concur with you, difficult to make exact predictions in our super volatile world that we live in at the moment. But what we do see is we did see demand. We are expecting that we can run our crackers on a high utilization for the rest of the year. We still see a lot of the supply chain issues persist. So July started significantly above the guidance for the full year. Maybe we see a little bit normalization and I think we should anticipate a little bit of pumpiness as we see supply and demand balancing out. but at this moment I would still see that third quarter started still on a good and strong note.

Thank you, Matt.

And we now come to Adnan Danani from RBC.

Hi, thanks for taking my question. I just wanted to ask around your UAE assets. For Buruj Chemicals Volumes, are you able to provide any color on the current status of exports? Obviously, you noted that production has been fully restored. I just want to know how much of that is being exported now, especially given the renewed tensions in the Strait. I think Buruj also in the release today flagged that while the assets are fully repaired, the production and second half might be constrained due to the feasible availability. So just want to get your thoughts there. And then on the upstream UAE volumes, when can you reasonably expect the liftings to resume there?

Thank you. Yeah, Adnan, thanks for the question. As I reported, all the damages are repaired and they have restored the full capacity. The constraint there is coming more from a feedstock availability at the moment. So that we are looking at about 60% of utilization for the logistics and evacuation of the material. Alternative routes were established. They are higher in cost. However, that kind of level of evacuation can be achieved through those alternative routes. and that would be kind of the expectation where we are now at the moment.

Yeah and add on to your second question on Upstream. We have not given up the hope for our first listings in Q3. So of course at the moment we are seeing quite So difficult situation for any kind of cargoes, but there is also a possibility for us, hopefully, to lead outside the Strait of Hormuz. So whether this will be possible or not, we will be able to then announce. But it is not that we have given up on that perspective also for Q3.

Thank you.

Thanks, Adnan. And next question comes from Chris Coupland, Bank of America.

Yeah, thank you, Florian. Alfred, best of luck for what's ahead of you. And I just wanted to double check more detail around the Borouge disclosure you've made today. I think that's very helpful. Short of a prospectus that I'm sure we're looking forward to for next year. But I wonder whether you can shed a little bit more light on what's hidden in your special items and revaluations. I noticed in your disclosure the 10 billion or so of book value that you've given your stake has remained unchanged from Q1. How are you going to treat the fair value assessment of BGI or BI, whatever we're meant to call it now? So I'm not sure, Alfred, that's one for you or for Reinhard.

Thank you, Chris. Thank you for the kind words and definitely it's one for Reinhard. I'm sure he, I mean, I can answer it, but I think he will give you a more professional answer here.

Yeah, Chris, I'll do my best. So regarding what's in the special items, there's actually two elements. One is adjustment of inventory valuations according to what was the difference between Q1 valuation and Q2 valuation. This is a one-time effect. This will not have any kind of further special character, but this is an effect that has have been taken into account here. And the second is simply transaction restructuring costs out of that that situation also one-time effects that we do not expect to recur. So the adjustments for the future we are seeing as minor or insignificant and this is a acute to one-time effect in the magnitude of closer to 150 million or something like that on an EBTA basis. compared to the 1.8 billion, also a small amount in that respect. And when it comes to the book values in OMV, there is no need, no intention to take book values down in any way. Of course, we have taken a so-called preliminary PPA for this transaction that will be finalized after or within the 12-month period. We have just seen that also in our case some of the inventory adjustments were running through the P&L without any cash effect. and that is also part of our special effects that we had in the OMV group. But again, the one-time effect, no effects for the further quarters.

Great. Thank you very much. We'll keep waiting for the IPO. Thank you.

Thanks Chris for your question and thanks everyone also for being disciplined and sticking to the one question only at the bank end of the Q&A session. So we're now coming to the end of the conference call and would like to thank you for joining us today. Should you have any further questions, please contact the IR team. We are happy to help. Have a happy Friday and goodbye. Thank you very much. Have a great Friday afternoon. Thank you.