Beijing Gas Blue Sky Achieved Turnaround in Profit in 2018; Revenue Increased by 48.1%

March 29, 2019 - 01:57
Beijing Gas Blue Sky Achieved Turnaround in Profit in 2018; Revenue Increased by 48.1%

Highlights

  • Revenue increased by 48.1% to HK$2,148.5million
  • Recorded a turnaround in profit, with profitfor the year attributable to owners of the Company amounted to HK$260.7 million
  • EBITDA of the Company increased by 162.6%to HK$642.6 million
  • Total gas sales and throughput volumeincreased by 898.4% to approximately 5,125 million cubic meters
  • As at 31 December 2018, the Group's natural gas projects covered 14provinces and autonomous regions in the PRC, namely Liaoning, Jilin,Hubei, Hebei, Shandong, Anhui, Zhejiang, Shaanxi, Guizhou,Hainan, Guangxi, Ningxia Autonomous Region, Shanxi and Beijing City
  • The Group owns a total of 34 gas refuelingstations for vehicles and 5 city gas projects


FinancialHighlights

 

 

 

 

Year ended 31 December

HK$ '000

2018

2017

Change

Revenue

2,148,480

1,451,140

+48.1%

 Natural gas for transportation

173,005

74,783

+131.3%

 Trading and distribution of natural gas

917,130

876,836

+4.6%

 City Gas and other related products

848,487

363,877

+133.2%

 Connection fee income

209,858

135,644

+54.7%

Gross Profit

198,372

167,574

+18.4%

Profit for the period attributable to owners of the Company

 

260,657

 

(12,489)

 

N/A

Basic earnings per share (HK cents)

2.27

(0.13)

N/A

 

HONG KONG, CHINA - Media OutReach - 29 March 2019 - Beijing Gas Blue Sky Holdings Limited ("the Company" or "BeijingGas Blue Sky", together with its subsidiaries, the "Group", HKSE stock code:6828) announced its annual results for the year ended 31 December 2018 ("2018").During the year, Beijing Gas Blue Sky recorded total revenue of HK$2,148.5million (2017: 1,451.1 million), representing a growth of 48.1% year-on-year, whichwas mainly attributable to a diversified income structure of the Group whichcontribute a growth in revenue generated from city gas business and liquefiednatural gas ("LNG") related business. The Company recorded a profitattributable to owners of the Company amounted to HK$260.7 million (2017: loss12.5 million).

 

During the Year, earnings per share were HK2.77 cents (2017: loss per share HK0.13 cents).

 

 

BUSINESS REVIEW

 

In 2018, the improvement on the overallprofitability of the Group was mainly due to its diversified businessstructure, under which different business segments all contributed to itsprofit growth. Specifically, the scale of the urban gas supply business hasbeen expanding rapidly. Benefiting from the "coal to gas" policy, the Group'srural coal-to-gas project in Shanxi has achieved good profits. Benefiting fromthe commencement of gas supply for the new projects secured in the Northeast,East and South China, the business scale and gross profit of the Group's directsupply business also increased significantly. The trading and distributionbusiness, notwithstanding its slightly shrunken scale, achieved an improvementin income and profitability as the Group attached greater importance to thequality of its business and the concerted development of the whole LNGindustrial chain; benefiting from the national environmental protection policy,the demand for the gas from the Group's Shanxi and Hainan projects increasedsignificantly, expanding the business scale and driving up the profit.

 

During the Year, total gas sales andthroughput volume of the Group increased by 898.4% as compared to thecorresponding period of last year to approximately 5,125 million cubic meters(2017: 513.3 million cubic meters). As at 31 December 2018, the Group's naturalgas projects covered 14provinces and autonomous regions in the PRC, namely Liaoning, Jilin,Hubei, Hebei, Shandong, Anhui, Zhejiang, Shaanxi, Guizhou,Hainan, Guangxi, Ningxia Autonomous Region, Shanxi and Beijing City.

 

CITY GAS BUSINESS

 

As of 2018, the Group had 5 city gasprojects in Shanxi Province, Jilin Province, Liaoning Province and HubeiProvince. During the year, the Group together with its associates and jointventures completed connection of piped gas for 59,870 new residential households,and the accumulated residential households reached 432,401 households, of which59,571 were new residential households. The volume of natural gas sold by theGroup to residential users amounted to 53.8 million cubic meters (2017: 18.9 millioncubic meters). The Group secured 299 new industrial and commercial users,totaling 2,236, and the natural gas sold to the industrial and commercial usersreached 84.4 million cubic meters (2017: 24.4 million cubic meters), withconnection fee income of HK$209.9 million (2017: HK$135.6 million), representinggrowth of 58.3% as compared to the corresponding period of last year.

 

During the period, the number of rural "coalto gas" users of the Group's Shanxi project amounted to approximately 7,000.Taking advantage of the "2+26" cities under the national air pollutionprevention program, the Group vigorously promoted the implementation of thecoal-to-gas project in Shanxi, and through effective management, its rural coal-to-gasprogram has produced satisfactory results, with its scale securing a leadingposition in Shanxi province.

 

The Group actively responded to nationalpolicies. In order to win the blue sky defense battle and improve the qualityof the atmospheric environment, the Group deepened the existing projectregional market and vigorously promoted the coal-to-gas process in the plainareas. What's more, by developing highquality industrial and commercial usersto adjust the gas consumption structure of the Northeast market, we continuedto improve the market system with the goal of "market integration" and made importantcontributions to the Group's overall gas volume and revenue.

 

In 2018, 12 ministries including theMinistry of Ecology and Environment and six provinces and cities such asBeijing jointly issued the "Action Plan for the Comprehensive Management of AirPollution in the Autumn and Winter of 2018-2019 in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei andSurrounding Areas", which clearly pointed out that the scattered coal shall bebasically replaced in the plain areas of "2+26" cities. At the same time,according to the guidelines of the National 13th Five-Year Plan, by 2020, theproportion of natural gas consumption to primary energy will increase from 6%in 2016 to 10%, and the population using natural gas will increase from 330 millionin 2015 to 470 million. In the future, the Group will continue to commit itselfto promoting the "coal to gas" work to improve the overall natural gaspenetration rate and hence contribute positively to the Group's overall profit.

 

In addition, the Group has entered into astrategic cooperation agreement with Guizhou Branch of PetroChina KunLun GasCo., Ltd.(中石油昆侖燃氣有限公司貴州分公司)("KunLun Guizhou") during the year, andboth parties would also strengthen strategic cooperation in the city gassegment in the region.

 

Industrial Direct Supply Business

 

During the year, the Group sold 89.2million cubic meters of natural gas (2017: 55.4 million cubic meters) toindustrial and commercial users, representing growth of 61.0% as compared tothe corresponding period of last year, covering Jilin Province, LiaoningProvince, Hubei Province, Shandong Province, Anhui Province, Hainan Province,Guizhou Province and Zhejiang Province, etc. The Group relied on thehigh-quality gas sources obtained in the North China, East China and SouthChina coastal areas and the inland LNG factories to provide industrial andcommercial users with stable gas sources. During the year, thanks to the rapidgrowth in the demand of the domestic industrial gas users and the continuousgrowth of imported LNG, the Group successfully secured a number of new users inthe Northeast, East and South China with continuous and stable gas supply. Duringthe period, both the revenue and profit of the business segment recorded anincrease.

 

CNG and LNG refueling stations

 

The Group together with its associates andjoint ventures sold natural gas to LNG vehicles (trucks and buses) and CNG vehicles(taxis, buses and private cars). During 2018, the Group owned 34 gas refuelingstations including 19 CNG refueling stations and 15 LNG refueling stations(2017: 39 gas refueling stations including 22 CNG refueling stations and 17 LNGrefueling stations), mainly covering Hainan Province, Anhui Province, ShandongProvince, Guizhou Province, Jilin Province, Shanxi Province and LiaoningProvince, with gas sales volume of 87.0 million cubic meters (2017: 75.3million cubic meters) and sales income of HK$173.0 million (2017: HK$74.8million), representing growth of 131.3% as compared to the corresponding periodof last year, which was mainly due to the effective implementation of theenvironmental protection policy on air pollution in Shanxi Province and HainanProvince.

 

Driven by the PRC government's promotionof clean energy vehicles, relevant policies on promoting application of environmentally-friendlyvehicles were recently introduced. Hainan Province issued the "Hainan ProvinceClean Energy Vehicles Development Plan" (hereinafter referred to as the"Plan"), which clearly points out that clean alternative fuel vehicles mainlyinclude natural gas vehicles, and plans to realize the overall adoption ofclean energy vehicles within the whole island by 2030, with 80% of the vehiclesinstalled with clean energy engines. The Group will actively expand the gasrefueling stations business in this region by grasping opportunities and actingin response to national policies, in order to improve its market share.

 

Trading and distribution of CNG and LNG

 

As of Year 2018, the Group currently owned29% equity interests in PetroChina Jingtang LNG Co., Ltd., and distributed LNGwith gas sources from Sinopec's Dongjiakou receiving terminal in the Bohai Rimand distributed LNG with gas sources from CNOOC's Ningbo receiving terminal in theEastern China. As the Group attached higher importance to the quality of itstrading business and actively adjusted its customer base, it recorded slightdecline in sales with total trading volume of 312.0 million cubic meters (2017:339.4 million cubic meters), through distributing LNG and 52 self-owned naturalgas transportation vehicles (2017: 67 natural gas transportation vehicles). Thetrading and distribution business recorded a segment trading volume of HK$917.1million (2017: 876.8 million cubic meters).

 

The Group participated in the bidding inthe window period with its partners last year, and won the joint distributionright of offshore gas in the peak period of demand for LNG and completed the distributionof 12 million cubic meters of LNG. The layout of the Group's LNG business has becomesolid, building up the upstream gas resources, the stronger midstream logisticsdeployment capacity as well as the downstream terminal distribution advantagesin the whole LNG industry; at the meantime, the Group has formed a "technology+ finance" overall solution for the industrial transfer of key industries suchas metal processing, ceramics and glass, which became our powerful tool for marketdevelopment. Therefore, the entire industrial chain of LNG has been fullydeveloped, so that all links could fully exert synergy effects and promote therapid growth of sales volume of LNG business.

 

LNG RECEIVING TERMINAL PROJECTS

 

PetrochinaJingtang Project (Caofeidian LNG Receiving Terminal)

 

The completion of the PetroChina JingtangProject took place on 6 June 2018. The total amount of LNG received in thisproject reached 4,498.5 million cubic meters after the mergers and acquisition,among which, the gas volume externally delivered to the pipelines throughgasification was 4,097.7 million cubic meters while the gas transportationvolume of the tank truck was 400.8 million cubic meters. Currently, as part ofthe Tangshan LNG expanding project, roof lifting for two storage tanks has beencompleted. It is expected that the utilization rate of the piers will continueto increase in the future, providing stable gas supply guarantee for naturalgas consumption in the entire Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and making positivecontributions to the blue sky defense battle in the region.

 

 

FUTURE PROSPECTS

 

Looking forward to 2019, the natural gasindustry will continue to maintain its growth momentum. The 2019 Chinesegovernment work report pointed out that the state should continue to strengthenpollution prevention and control and ecological construction, vigorouslypromote green development, continue to promote pollution prevention and controland consolidate and expand the achievements of the blue sky defense battle. Italso continued to carry out the air pollution control of theBeijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and the surrounding areas, Yangtze River Delta andthe Yan-Ping Plains and strengthened the management of three major pollution sourcesof industry, coal-firing and motor vehicles, striving to do well in cleanheating in the northern regions and ensure that the people can enjoy a warmwinter. The Group expects natural gas consumption to continue to grow steadily.Imported natural gas will continue to be a major source of growth for thesupply. The Group will strive to capture relevant opportunities arising fromthe growth in LNG import and the integration of the pipelines in the PRC.

 

As for the market, the Group will focus onthe layout of projects related to LNG import and new project opportunities withwith the support of major shareholder. After several years of hard work, theGroup has built a large-scale LNG operation and distritribution capacity andcompleted the layout of the entire industrial chain of LNG. On the upstreamside, we have stable gas sources for several LNG receiving terminals, hold theequity of the LNG receiving terminal located in Tangshan and successfully participatedin the first international trading of LNG. We have built a proprietary trading andlogistics network in the key Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei and the East China regionfor the midstream, while there are stable and large-scale industrial users inthe downstream.

 

In the future, in addition to continuingto consolidate the trading and operating capabilities as well as the size and qualityof the end customers in the midstream and downstream, the Group willparticipate more in the upstream LNG trading and obtain more opportunities toindependently import offshore resources under the general trend of the naturalgas industry marketization, with a view to enhancing the Group'scompetitiveness and market share in the LNG industry.

 

In terms of city gas business, the Group willleverage the unique advantages of the major shareholder Beijing Gas Group toexplore project opportunities of major shareholders in theBeijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and the northeast region along the East Pipelinebetween China and Russia and lay out key new project markets. For the existingcity gas projects, the Group will adhere to refined management to improve theprofitability of existing projects and achieve steady growth in the income ofexisting urban gas assets, and also leverage the existing projects'"point-to-face" capability to focus on tapping the market potential of Shanxiand Jilin.

 

In terms of company management, guided byrefined management, the Group will comprehensively carry out "reducing costsand increasing efficiency" under the principle of "large industry with smallheadquarter" by optimizing organizational structure and personnel and strictlycontrolling expenses, so as to improve the project execution efficiency and enhancethe Group's comprehensive profitability. In terms of finance, the financingchannel will be broadened, and with the normal operation of the projectsacquired and the support of the major shareholder, the debt ratio and the scaleof current loans will be appropriately increased through more cooperation withcommercial banks; moreover, we will achieve a reasonable decline in financialexpenses by replacing original high-cost debts, so as to improve the Group'sprofitability.

About Beijing Gas Blue Sky Holdings Limited

Beijing Gas Blue Sky Holdings Limited ("Beijing Gas Blue Sky", HKSEstock code: 6828) is an integrated natural gas provider, distributor andoperator, with an emphasis on the midstream and downstream natural gasdevelopment. Our natural gas business includes: (i) construction and operationof compressed natural gas ("CNG") and liquefied natural gas ("LNG") refuelingstations for vehicles; (ii) construction of natural gas pipelines and operationof city gas projects by providing piped gas; (iii) direct supply of LNG toend-users; and (iv) trading and distribution of CNG and LNG.

 

The Group has adapted to the "One Belt One Road" policy, and focus onoperating and investing natural gas business. The Group is actively expandingits business development and distribution, as well as continues to graduallyexpanding the scale of operations. Currently, theGroup's natural gas projects covered 14 provinces and autonomous regions in thePRC, namely Liaoning, Jilin, Hubei, Hebei, Shandong, Anhui, Zhejiang, Shaanxi,Guizhou, Hainan, Guangxi, Ningxia Autonomous Region, Shanxi and Beijing City. TheGroup is committed to its vision: "develop clean energy, enhance customervalue, create a beautiful blue sky". In the future, it will continue toactively investing and developing natural gas business, as well asparticipating in the development of natural gas industry value chain.

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