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Maersk sees 2014 pretax profit down 20 pct

Xinhua, February 25, 2015 Adjust font size:

Danish oil and shipping group A.P. Moeller-Maersk saw a 20 percent decline in pretax profit in 2014, the company announced Wednesday.

Profit before tax for the full year 2014 was 5.311 billion U.S. dollars, down 20 percent from 6.62 billion dollars in 2013, the Maersk Group said in its annual financial statement.

While the sale of the majority share of Dansk Supermarked Group and other divestment contributed positively, the results for 2014 were dragged down by writedowns totaling 3 billion dollars.

The container shipping division Maersk Line delivered a higher than expected profit of 2.3 billion dollars, up from 1.5 billion dollars in 2013, due to stronger than expected volumes as well as lower unit costs from continued optimisation and lower bunker prices partly countered by lower freight rates.

The company's oil business delivered a loss of 861 million dollars, compared to a profit of 1 billion dollars the previous year, owing to 1.7 billion dollars writedown on its assets in Brazil.

But its share of oil and gas production increased by 7 percent to 251,000 barrels of oil per day (boepd) as a result of improved operational performance, production from new projects as well as a higher share of production from Qatar due to the lower oil price.

Meanwhile, the drilling and rig business posted 478 million dollars profit, down from 528 million dollars, year-on-year.

The terminals and ports business made a loss of 230 million dollars, down from a loss of 85 million dollars year-on-year.

Maersk said the result was negatively impacted by a goodwill impairment of 357 million dollars related to the Adsteam acquisition in Australia and significant non-trading costs in Damco related to impairments, restructuring and other adjustments.

Maersk on Wednesday also announced the decision to divest its 20.05 percent ownership stake in Danske Bank.

"In the continuing efforts to focus our portfolio and share value creation with our shareholders, it has been decided to divest our Danske Bank shares,"said Maersk CEO Nils Smedegaard Andersen in the statement.

In 2015, Maersk Group "expects an underlying result slightly below 4 billion dollars excluding Danske Bank."

For its part, Maersk Line aims to improve its competitiveness through unit cost reductions and implementation of the new 2M alliance with Mediterranean Shipping Co. and "expects a higher underlying result than for 2014."

Maersk Line expects the global demand for seaborne container transportation to increase by 3-5 percent.

Maersk Oil expects a significantly lower underlying result for 2015 than for 2014 as break-even is reached with oil prices in the range 55-60 dollars per barrel.

And the share of oil and gas production is expected to be at a level of around 265,000 boepd.

The terminals business expects a result in line with 2014 results, while drilling operations forecast a underlying result higher than that in 2014. Endit