In Q1'22, SEPLAT bettered the corresponding period of last year on all financial metrics (save for PAT, which was blighted by a higher tax charge). For context, PBT grew by over 2.3 times despite the production setbacks that forced liquids output from OMLs 4, 38 & 41, and OML 53 down by 11.0% and 5.8% YoY, respectively. According to SEPLAT, production in the former was disrupted by outages in the Trans Forcados Pipeline (TFP), which experienced a downtime of 23.0%. Gas volumes were also down 6.1% YoY, impacted by lower demand due to price renegotiation, and supply constraints caused by equipment accessory issues at Oben. Therefore, the key to the company's robust performance was a materially higher realisable oil price, which completely masked the effect of volume weakness on earning.
