(Adds CEO, CFO quotes, forecasts, analyst, share price)
By Jan Korselt
PRAGUE, Feb 29 (Reuters) - Czech oil processing group
Unipetrol <> posted a worse-than-expected fourth
quarter 2007 loss on Friday and gave a cautious profit forecast,
sending its shares down.
The company reported a 557 million crown ($33.61 million)
net loss in the final three months of the last year, larger than
the 319 million loss estimated by seven analysts in a Reuters
survey.
The company, majority owned by Poland's PKN Orlen <PKNA.WA>,
was hit by an accident which extended modernisation shutdowns of
the main processing lines in the third and fourth quarter and by
a slump in margins toward the end of the year from previous
strong levels.
"Not only have we had a significant impact on the financial
result because of the shutdown, because of the explosion ... but
also we had severe pressure on margins (in the fourth quarter),"
Chief Executive Francois Vleugels told a news conference.
"The extremely rapid increase in crude oil price was such
that we could not pass it on to the customers."
Fourth-quarter revenue dipped 3 percent year-on-year to
21.15 billion crowns, above market forecast of 20.44 billion.
Fourth-quarter operating loss reached 657 million versus market
expectations for a loss of 353 million.
The shutdowns shaved 2.8 billion crowns from full-year
operating profit, reducing it to 4.8 billion crowns.
Unipetrol said it saw a gradual improvement in margins in
the first quarter from lows in the late 2007, but Chief
Executive Officer Wojciech Ostrowski still forecast merely flat
operating result for 2008.
"Margins in (first half of) 2007 were very good... The
assumption is that the margins will not be as good as in 2007,"
he told Reuters.
The company, worth $3.1 billion, also said its budget for
this year did not include a provision for dividends.
The company has been flagging possible dividend payments or
a share buyback in case it finds no acquisition targets, and
Ostrowski said the policy should be decided in a mid-term plan
due to be finalised by mid-2008.
Analyst Petr Novak of brokerage Atlantik FT said he saw the
profit forecast as too cautious.
"I think that this is a very conservative forecast and that
the actual result will definitely be higher, unless there is an
unpredicted shutdown," he said.
The stock dropped 2.1 percent to 280 crowns by 1145 GMT
after the results, underperforming the Prague PX <> index
which lost 0.5 percent.
The fourth quarter loss put full-year profit at 1.3 billion
crowns, down from 1.69 billion in 2006 on revenue of 88.78
billion.
Full-year earnings per share dipped to 7.16 crowns from
8.82.
(Writing by Jan Lopatka; Editing by Erica Billingham and David
Cowell)
