OMV Aktiengesellschaft (OMV) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, a very warm welcome to our live webcast presentation of OMV's results for the first 3 quarters 2020. My name is Andreas Rinofner, and as usual, we will start with a video for a short overview. [Presentation]

Ladies and gentlemen, it's more than obvious that the past few months have been a great challenge for all of us and for almost all companies. Our CEO, Mr. Rainer Seele, will give you some details and background of how OMV dealt with these challenges. After the presentation, you have the opportunity to ask questions. [Operator Instructions] Let me now hand over to Mr. Seele.

Yes. Thank you. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to OMV's 9-month results presentation, and thank you for joining us today. Before we come to the results, let us take a look at the macroeconomic environment. 2020 has been dominated by a demand shock triggered by the coronavirus pandemic that has pushed the oil markets into significant oversupply. The global oil demand in 2020 is estimated to be around 8% lower than in 2019, the sharpest downturn in oil demand in recent history. The Brent price fell from around $70 per barrel at the start of the year to a 21-year low of around $13 per barrel in April following the disagreement among OPEC+ producers on cuts and the decrease in global oil demand. WTI crudes turned negative for the first time ever. After the trough in April, prices rebounded to around $40 per barrel as demand slowly showed signs of recovery and the OPEC+ discipline took significant volumes of the market. On the first 9 months of the year, the Brent price averaged $41 per barrel, a decline of 36% compared to the same period of 2019. The fall in gas prices was even sharper. Central European gas prices averaged EUR 8.7 per megawatt hour in the first 3 quarters of 2020, a decrease of 43% versus the same period of 2019. The main reasons were mild winter, increased supply due to the ramp-up of global LNG capacities and decreased demand because of the pandemic. We have seen some positive signs in the third quarter. Prices rebounded, starting September, driven by reduced import of LNG volumes into Europe and increased European gas demand. In the downstream business, we also saw a challenging and fragile environment. After starting the year at $4.8 -- $4.9 per barrel in the third quarter, the refining indicator margin fell sharply to below $1 per barrel, the lowest level in a decade. Averaging $2.70 per barrel in the 9 months, the indicator margin was down 37% year-on-year. The reason for the collapse of the refining margins was a significant demand decline across the entire product range and especially in jet fuel. The aviation activity declined more than 90% during the lockdown period. Since jet fuel cannot be stored for long and air traffic was subdued, some refiners have converted jet into distillates production while maintaining resilient utilization rate. This led to a significant oversupply situation in the market. Contrary to refining margins, the petrochemical margins were more resilient. After the ethylene and propylene margins rose in the first quarter, in May and June, they came under pressure from rapid rising raw material costs. Naphtha prices more than doubled, and the higher feedstock cost could not be passed through entirely to the market in the same period. Demand remained robust, supported by packaging and health care, and a slow recovery was seen in the construction and automotive sectors. The ethylene and propylene net margins averaged EUR 409 per ton in the first 9 months of 2020, 10% lower than in the same period of 2019. Ladies and gentlemen, despite such a challenging macro environment, with an unprecedented simultaneous deterioration in both upstream and downstream markets, we were able to achieve quite a resilient result due to our integrated and diversified value chain. In the first 9 months, our clean CCS operating result amounted to EUR 1.2 billion, which was 58% lower than the prior year period. While upstream was substantially impacted by the decrease in oil and gas prices turning negative, downstream proved very resilient, and performance declined by only 11% versus 2019. In the same period, the operating cash flow decreased by 20% but still amounted to a solid EUR 2.5 billion. We had a strong first quarter with around EUR 1.1 billion operating cash flow as the coronavirus impact was not significant until March. In the second quarter, when we felt the full force of the lockdowns and demand contraction, OMV still managed to generate an operating cash flow of EUR 0.5 billion. And in the third quarter, it rose again to around EUR 800 million, a sign of the quality and resilience of our integrated portfolio in this very challenging environment. Let me now go into more detail for each of the business areas. In upstream, the clean operating result decreased by around EUR 1.5 billion to minus EUR 39 million, a direct reflection of substantially lower oil and gas prices. Production declined by 4% to 460,000 barrels per day. The main reason for this was the shutdown of production in Libya, although this was partially offset by higher production in Malaysia, where 3 gas fields started up this year. Even if the total production decreased, we managed to keep costs at the previous year level of $6.7 per barrel. In downstream, despite the depressed demand and the sharp fall in refining margins, we achieved a clean CCS operating result of EUR 1.1 billion in the first 9 months of 2020. Positive contributions came from the middle distillates margin, hedges, improved retail margins, strong oil trading and an excellent performance of the natural gas business. Total refined product sales fell by 15%, mainly driven by the significant drop in jet fuel volumes. Nevertheless, we were able to run our refineries at 87%. The integration with our strong retail network and the forward integration into petrochemicals, which allows us to crack jet fuel into petrochemicals and enable us to run our refineries above the European average of around 70%. The petrochemicals result, including contribution from Borealis, decreased by 32% year-on-year, mainly driven by the decline in olefin and polyolefin margins. The sales volumes in Europe were stable. Lower demand in the automotive and construction industries was compensated by an increase in demand in packaging and health care. The contribution from ADNOC Refining was negatively impacted by an extended turnaround and by the significant decline of refining margins globally. Earnings from the gas business more than doubled compared to the first 3 quarters of the previous year to EUR 258 million. This exceptional performance was due to a strong storage business result and higher earnings from the power business in Romania. Gas sales volumes rose by 24%, driven by increased sales, especially in Romania and Germany, but also in the Netherlands, Belgium and Hungary. Ladies and gentlemen, in the first 9 months of this year, our industry has faced unprecedented challenges, global oversupply, massive destruction of demand caused by the pandemic, together with pressure to improve the response to climate change. The market environment remains volatile, and the uncertainty created by the pandemic shows little signs of decreasing [Audio Gap] a few weeks ago. However, at this point, we can't reliably estimate what contribution to this year's production will be possible from Libya. In Downstream, due to continued weak aviation sector and increase of traveling restrictions in many countries, we assume an indicator refining margin of around $2.50 per barrel for the full year. For petrochemicals, the outlook is more optimistic. We estimate that 2020 ethylene and propylene margins to be slightly below the previous year's level. The utilization rate of our European refineries is expected to be around 85% in 2020. In the fourth quarter, we are undertaking scheduled maintenance works at Schwechat refinery for roughly 3 weeks. Organic investments, those without acquisitions are projected to come in at around EUR 1.7 billion, excluding Borealis investments. Ladies and gentlemen, let us briefly look beyond this year and turn to the long-term strategic path of the company. The industry is going through a massive disruption. The key question is how should OMV look like to exist and thrive in a low-carbon world? OMV will remain an integrated company, a business model, which yields a resilient cash generation through the cycle. In Upstream, we will increase the production of natural gas, while in Downstream, we pursue an increase of the share of nonenergy chemical products and aim to become a leader in the circular economy. Earlier this morning, we announced the closing of the additional 39% share acquisition in Borealis, thus increasing our stake to 75%. Based on the agreed purchase price, the cash out for OMV, net cash acquired, is EUR 3.8 billion. The adjustments include the first quarter dividends to which OMV is entitled based on the increased shareholding, currency effects and the cash position of Borealis at closing. Borealis is a fantastic strategic fit for OMV. Firstly, the transaction improves our financial strength and our natural hedge against the volatile macro environment. Secondly, by combining capacities, we will form a major Austrian-based global player in an attractive chemical growing market. Last but not least, this is a decisive step in our transformation to position OMV successfully in a low-carbon future and will be a springboard to become a leader in the circular economy. Borealis has been a highly profitable business with strong cash flows in the last 5 years, and we believe that the long-term fundamentals of the business will continue to be strong. In 2020, despite the difficult macro environment, Borealis delivered the first 9 months a resilient operating cash flow including dividends from Borouge of EUR 1.1 billion, which is 6% higher than the same period of last year. This challenging year has demonstrated how vital Borealis products are in our everyday life, especially in a crisis such as the coronavirus pandemic and has confirmed Borealis' competitive advantages. In addition to the cash flows generated by the robust operations by combining these 2 businesses, we expect to achieve material synergies. Following the work of joint teams to identify synergies in the last 6 months, we now increase the synergy potential from EUR 700 million to more than EUR 800 million until 2025. Chemicals is an attractive growing market in which OMV will become a significant player. By combined capacities, OMV will almost double its production capacities of ethylene and propylene and become #1 in Europe. As a polyolefin producer, we will become second in Europe and #8 globally. We are convinced that chemicals and polymers will be, without any doubt, needed also in 2050 and beyond. They are playing a crucial role in the energy transition, for example, as solar panels and wind mills. They are essential for efficient installation of buildings and electricity transportation and they help to reduce weight in the transportation sector by replacing heavier materials such as steel or aluminum. With this transaction, our portfolio changes towards nonenergy, low-emission products as chemicals are not burned. They are an important pillar of our strategy for reducing emissions intensity. Plastics recycling for us is a business imperative as well as an opportunity. Together with Borealis, we want to become a leading company in the [Audio Gap] circular economy. Borealis activities and mechanical recycling are a perfect match to OMV's chemical recycling ReOil. Both will make a key contribution to realizing the EU waste target in Austria: 50% of plastic packaging must be recycled by 2025. Ladies and gentlemen, in March this year, simultaneously with the Borealis acquisition, we announced the divestment program of EUR 2 billion by 2021. In 6 months, we have already executed an important step. We signed the sale agreement with Verbund for the 51% share in our gas logistics subsidiary, Gas Connect Austria. This will reduce OMV's net debt by more than EUR 570 million. For the second project, the retail network in Germany, we have received binding offers and are currently in negotiations. We expect signing until end of this year. In the last 5 years, we have been very active in reshaping our portfolio through significant acquisitions and divestments. At the same time, we increased the level of cash flows and remained committed to our progressive dividend policy. We plan to maintain the same discipline in the future. Thank you for your attention. I now look forward to your questions.

Thank you, Mr. Seele. And now we come directly to the Q&A session. We have already some questions, and there are a couple of questions regarding the Borealis closing this morning. I will start with a question of [ Kurt Baylios and Agidi Sion]. And he is very happy about the message that we closed the deal. And his question is, what is the benefit for OMV owning 25 -- 75% compared to 36%. What is the value-add for OMV?

Well, with the 75% share in Borealis, we definitely have a controlling stake. So we can lift the synergy potential, and I explained to you that the potential of synergies was now upgraded to more than EUR 800 million. This is to the benefit of both companies. And with a higher share, we are participating also on a higher level from Borealis cash flow from Borealis dividends, of course. And especially with the higher share, we can show you the sleeping beauty of Borealis in our portfolio. In the past, we haven't fully consolidated the business of Borealis. Now it is becoming visible. And if you look what's happening with OMV, since today, after closing, OMV is growing by 1/3. If you look into the turnovers we have published in the last years, you will see that OMV stands for a good EUR 20 billion to EUR 25 billion. Borealis is good for a EUR 10 billion turnover, which means that 1/3 of additional business is now coming into the balance sheet of OMV. We will have seen in cash flow an operating cash flow of EUR 1.1 billion this year in a very tough environment. And what we are earning is the higher robustness of our integrated business model. The OMV of the future is more robust, more stable, and we can balance out the economic cycles in the different business units. And with Borealis, we have created a captive market behind our petchem operations. This is an optimization potential we have seen especially this year. Compared to other peers, OMV was able to crack the jet into petrochemicals. We were able to do so because we have seen Borealis as our main customer for the petchem operations. If you don't have that value chain in-house, you really have difficulties to deal with jet in these days. And what others are doing, they're cracking it into middle distillates, where you only see a very low-margin environment. That's why the entire profitability of OMV can be optimized by the new OMV group, including Borealis.

I will continue with Matthias Auer DiePresse. His question is also about -- with regard to Borealis, in particular, to the purchase price, and he wants to know how do you comment, Mr. Seele, on claims, what we might have paid to match for Borealis?

Well, I don't want to challenge whether or not others can calculate the value of Borealis better than OMV, a company which has founded Borealis and a company which is a shareholder since more than 2 decades and a company, which is the only the -- which is -- which can only calculate based on the business plan of Borealis. What I have demonstrated is that we have done a fair transaction between Mubadala and OMV. This was also the reaction we have seen in the financial markets. And what I can say, it is a fair transaction. And from my point of view, I had good messages today. The operating cash flow of Borealis is 6% higher than previous year, and that's in a COVID-type pandemic. And the cash flow is the basis you are calculating the value of companies. And the cash flow comes in on a higher level. And we have demonstrated that we even see higher synergies. So I think there is more upside in our Borealis shareholding than a downside, which I have seen sometimes in the press and I cannot understand.

Then I continue with Matthias Wabl from Bloomberg News. He has in total 3 questions regarding Borealis. And I start with one of his because it's a little bit similar. Can you please shed a light on the discussion about the purchase price for Borealis? Did you consider to try to renegotiate the price after Borealis lowered its full year business outlook on March?

Well, Mr. Wabl, I have answered your question. We have now all the numbers on the table. This is a fair transaction, and this is based on our professional calculation of the value, like we have done all transactions before. We have an active portfolio management since many, many years. And on both sides, acquisitions and divestments, we have a highly professional team, and this team has locked in an attractive transaction for OMV.

He has 2 more questions regarding Borealis. The first one is what's the plan for the integration of Borealis. Will Alfred Stern remain CEO or will Thomas Gangl get a more prominent role, possibly as Borealis CEO and Board member of OMV?

Well, I will not comment on any kind of speculations you are doing, especially as I am not the one who is going to decide on these fantasy moves you're here asking. This is in the -- is the task of Supervisory Board, and I don't want to comment anything in the name of the Supervisory Board.

And the next question, just last one, is regarding the Supervisory Board. What are your expectations from the new role of Mark Garrett? Do you expect additional support for your strategy? How do you get along with him?

Mark and I do know each other since quite a long time, and he -- I respect him as a very professional expert, and we are looking forward to have a very good cooperation together.

Okay. I think I will continue with one of the burning topics in general public related to corona crisis. There is one question from Max Nichols, what do you expect for the upcoming months? Would another lockdown affect your business?

And that's an interesting question. I think everybody is now thinking about it. I have another question. So of course, what kind of lockdown are we going to see? Is it the German type of lockdown? Is it French type of lockdown? Who is going to have what kind of lockdown? So far, I don't see any political decision that we have a lockdown like we have seen in April. It's very important whether or not we are taking care on the economic recovery we have seen so far. If we remember, in April, May, there was a production still stand in the automotive industry in Germany impacting the entire supply chain. So it's depending what kind of lockdown we really see. When we talk about our business, the uncertainties about potential lockdowns is currently impacting, of course, the oil price development. We see that also happening in the refining sector. I'm afraid that the recovery of jet fuel demand is not happening in the fourth quarter. We are going to shift this into '21. And I think we have to wait for the holiday season. So we will see in the fourth quarter more -- slightly increasing pressure on the refining business. We might see a lower contribution from oil production in upstream. But I also have some positive news, especially what we have seen in the 2 lockdown quarters or 2 pandemic quarters, I have to say. Q2 and Q3 is that we do have a very resilient natural gas business, and natural gas business is not -- is more resilient, is not so much impacted by the pandemic. We see that temperatures are driving the business more than the pandemic. We see right now relatively good natural gas prices, which is the first quarter, which is above the previous year quarter. So natural gas will continue positively. Although we are talking of these lockdowns, I think we will continue to see a pretty stable business also in the fourth quarter in chemicals, in Borealis polymer business as well as in refining -- as well as in retail business. The challenges awaiting OMV is upstream, the oil and gas production as well as the refining business.

There is another question on lockdown. Do you think the recent lockdown decisions in Germany and other countries impact gas and oil prices as well as overall demand for the fuels?

Fuel demand is already 6% to 7% below previous year quarter or previous year demand. I think we will see a further decline in demand in fuels as the lockdown decision in Germany is restricting also national traffic. That's why I think fuel consumption will be a little bit further declining. It will -- the natural gas business, I have answered your question, is more the heating season now locking at the door and the storage level determining the gas prices in the fourth quarter. Right now, so far, so good. It was an early arrival of lower temperatures in the European markets. Now it's warming up a bit, but maybe we will see an early winter arriving in Europe, and then we do have an upside potential. If we do see a mild winter knocking at the door again, then there is a downside.

We now come to our retail business in Germany, and there are 2 questions. The first one from [indiscernible]. Due to the sale of the German retail network, do you have received binding offers each for the whole network? Or is there also the opportunity to sell the German retail network in several packages?

As we have received binding offers, and we are now in the hot phases to negotiate the offers, it's for the entire network, and we will not decide to sell in packages.

And the second question is, what is interesting for a purchaser on the retail network, given the fact that e-mobility is increasing?

Well, first of all, we continue to produce fuels in our refinery. And I think it's interesting to get a captive market behind your refineries. What we have seen during the 2 quarters when the pandemic was determining the demand in Germany, if you don't have a captive sales channel through a retail network, you really have to reduce your capacity utilization in your refineries heavily. That's one of the secrets why OMV was outperforming their peers in terms of high utilization rates in the refineries. That's the most interesting part. The question is how do you prepare yourself for the e-mobility. I think if you are running a retail network, at the end of the day, you can sell fuels, but you also can sell electrons. And at the end of the day, you also have a nonfuels business, and that's more or less the question, what kind of strategy the company or the buyer has in mind for the future retail network. It will be a combination of both. It's not black or white from my point of view.

Then we come to the Chapter Nord Stream 2, and there are also 2 questions. The first one from [ Julia Gazageva ] from [ Press ]. Do you admit to possibility of freezing the Nord Stream 2 project and, in this case, will OMV demand a return on investment from Gazprom?

Well, we are -- we continue to be highly committed to the Nord Stream 2 project. It is a transportation project, which is of value for the European gas market, which is of value for OMV. I think it's too early to speculate on any return on investments and so on. We do have a contractual base with the -- with Gazprom financing the project. We have done our job, and now we have to sit and wait whether or not the pipe company, Nord Stream 2, is going and when it's continuing to do the job in pipeline. So after we have a clear picture there, I really can answer your question.

And the second question coming from Günther Strobl from Der Standard. How many money has OMV invested in the Nord Stream 2 project? And when is it necessary to depreciate this amount of money?

Well, around EUR 730 million we have sent as credit lines into the Nord Stream 2 company. We will not depreciate. I think your question is more an impairment. So we don't see any need to impair our financing in Nord Stream 2 project.

And the second question from Gunter, Standard. Do you see any impact of the corona crisis? And how is the impact of corona crisis and it's shrunk oil prices, its impact on negotiations around Achimov?

Well, there is no impact because we are not negotiating. We have now scheduled that Achimov, we have time until 2022. And that's why we are busy doing our job now to optimize our current running business, and especially that there are no flights going to Moscow or St. Petersburg. The teams are not meeting. So we have to sit and wait. It's too early to start negotiations. Therefore, no corona impact because we are not doing so.

Next question from Jaime Concha, Energy Intelligence, is on upstream and gas business, OMV says that gas will be your upstream focus. Which areas will be the company's priority and why?

Well, we are going to operate close to the markets. And we do have a very strong market position in Romania. And especially the Neptun project is of major importance for the country. Romania would be forced to import more gas, for example, from Russia if they are not developing the Neptun project. So a very attractive market, which is known by OMV Petrom is waiting for -- to support the development of the Neptun project. So that's the biggest project. Then we are going to invest into additional gas production in Malaysia because we are supplying via liquefaction of the gas, the Chinese market, and this is a very attractive growing market for natural gas. We're investing into gas in Norway. This is on stream. We have done a recent recovery with Hades & Iris. So this is in our project pipeline to supply the natural gas market in Europe. So our natural gas projects in upstream are always backed through a very strong market position, and that's why we are focusing on these regions.

There is a second question from Jaime. Has OMV's views on Black Sea gas exploration changed after Turkey's large gas fund, will this push forward FID for upstream ventures there such as Neptun Deep?

We are not in competition to Turkey, to be honest. Yes. I congratulate everybody who's going to have an exploration success. It doesn't matter which national background is coming with any participant. We will decide on the FID on Neptun not depending on any gas discovery in the Black Sea. It's just depending on 2 issues, whether or not we get the satisfying framework from the government in Romania, and I'm afraid we have to wait the election upcoming now in November to get an answer on this question. And the second is, as you know, our consortium, Exxon, has decided to divest their stake in the Neptun project. And we have to wait and see who is going to be our consortium partner in the Neptun project. These are the 2 points I have to claim to be ready to go for an FID decision.

The next question I have coming from Julia is on green deal and climate. Do you think the green deal offers new opportunities for OMV? Also in terms of power carbon trading, are you looking at increasing your energy trading teams to account for any potential opportunities? Or has the green deal, new EU carbon reduction targets impacted your energy trading at all?

Well, the new green deal is a future project. It's not impacting our current trading activities to any max. So the green deal is, from my point of view, an opportunity for OMV to invest into, let's say, green and sustainable projects. That's how we are going to participate. So some projects for renewable energy, which are backed to our equity demand power, we will apply for the new green deal umbrella. Under the umbrella, we would like to discuss this activity. We will also increase our research activities for CO2-neutral -- neutrality for bioenergy products from our refinery. We will apply for hydrogen projects based on green hydrogen, together with our partner, Verbund, over here in Austria. We also will apply for the circular economy projects we have in mind. Having said the ReOil project, which is not only based on the CO2 emissions, I think we also have to clean up our planet that we get rid -- that we use, not get rid of our waste that we understand waste as a valuable feedstock like we are doing. So it's a long list of projects we will apply. I can also not talk about the photolysis, we do have in our research team. So there is a long list of projects, where, OMV, together with some partners, will apply also for funding from the green deal in Europe. Of course, we will contribute.

And the last question I have at the moment in my mailbox is from Mr. Sweetly, 2 questions regarding carbon capturing. What is the status of OMV's plans regarding carbon capture for storage and carbon capture for industrial utilization?

Well, the CCS technology has limitations, as we speak about the application in some European member states. And there is a ban also over here in Austria. So therefore, CCS is rather limited. We have some small research activities, which are allowed under the current framework. But if we don't see a change of the framework, I think the application of CCS here in our country is rather limited. There are -- but as we talk about carbon's capture utilization, we have started a bigger cooperation, especially that we would like to use the CO2, which is exhausting in the cement production. And Borealis and Verbund are the 2 partners to transform the CO2 into polypropylene molecules. It's the chemical know-how from OMV in between, as we speak about the hydrogen being used for the hydrogenation of the CO2 molecule. It's the renewable power from Verbund which will be used to produce green hydrogen in the project. And Lafarge, of course, is enriching the CO2 because we need a high CO2 content in the gas stream. And Borealis will use then the -- from CO2 converted molecules to market these as CCU polymers made by Borealis.

The second question from Mr. Sweetly is on hydrogen. What type of hydrogen should be prioritized in order to speed up decarbonization and help the economy out of the corona crisis?

Oh, I think I'm a fan not to color the hydrogen gas. Hydrogen by itself is anyhow a colorless gas, and we should keep it as the chemist is telling you. If we focus only on green hydrogen and if we would like to move the hydrogen industry because we limit ourselves in the beginning just to green hydrogen, then it's going to be a very long-lasting story. What I think is, we have to prepare the market, and we have to produce hydrogen, especially in large amounts, to simultaneously build up the value chain for hydrogen. And then we can produce, of course, like the industry is doing in these days, like for the production in fertilizers, hydrogen out of natural gas. Of course, we are producing -- producing or emitting also CO2 in this process, if we go for natural gas to hydrogen. But as I mentioned also earlier, there is a chemical reaction we call photolysis where we can split the methane molecule into solid carbon and 2 molecules of hydrogen. This is a technology, from my point of view, with a high potential. And we should also allow to produce, they call it blue hydrogen, that we make a combination of natural gas burning into or transforming it into hydrogen and underground storage, CCS as a combination. It doesn't matter if we would like to create a market. In the first instance, of course, we should think about a highly possible share of green hydrogen. But in the beginning, I only can recommend we should not color the gas. We should produce the hydrogen as much as possible to prepare the market.

At the moment I mentioned I received the last question, I received 3 more in the mailbox. And there is one follow-up question from Julia from regarding fuel. You said fuel demand is down 6% to 7%. That is at the moment or during Q3 in Austria or Europe. And how steep could the further expected decline be and when?

Well, the 6% to 7% is the current reduction in fuels demand compared to the previous year demand. In Q3, we have seen the demand -- the fuels demand recovering to previous year level in September. The driving season was helping, and individual transport is getting a higher priority to protect for -- to protect against COVID-19 infection. So that was helping and people were spending the holidays more in their countries, avoiding taking a flight and just taking their car. So this was supporting the recovery. The 6% to 7% lower fuels demand is in all the retail networks OMV has in Europe. In some countries, it's more. In some, it's less. But in average, we do see that 6% to 7%. And the all-time high of the shutdown in April, the fuels demand was down by 50% between -- by around 50% to 60%; in some countries, even 70%. But this lockdown was coming also with the borders, closing the border lines so that there was no transnational traffic between Austria and Germany, for example. This is not on the list so far. So especially the heavy traffic is still on the route. So I wouldn't assume this order of magnitude if we're going to see these softer lockdowns like Germany or France has now implemented since yesterday.

The next question is also on fuels for individual mobility from [indiscernible]. Hydrogen is important for OMV as well as e-fuel, synthetic fuels. Is this also in the individual sector of the car mobility?

Well, the H2 mobility, I think we do have a car fleet. If hydrogen will move into the individual car mobility, I think the automotive industry has to dedicate their investment activity as much as in electric vehicles. I can't see that happening. There are some e-mobility activities from Japan, swapping also into the German market or into the European markets. But this is only a minor development I do see right now. So if there is a stronger commitment coming for individual cars? Yes, I see hydrogen as an interesting development in the automotive industry as we talk about trucks. I think hydrogen trucks is -- and hydrogen buses is a potential you can look in. The second -- what was the second part of the question? Yes, e-fuels. Well, e-fuels, I think, is the only perspective, especially for the airline industry to get a better CO2 footprint. So the first address as a refiner when you talk about e-fuels I'm afraid will be the airline industry. But I can't -- I don't exclude that, especially in individual transport, we are going to see this. The e-fuels that do have already an, let's say, competitive situation, as we talked about, the automotive industry, as we are going to see more switch into biofuels happening in the refineries than into e-fuels.

And one more question on Libya. It's coming from Andreas Mihm, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. How do you judge the situation in Libya? And what are your expectations for the next months and 2021, do you consider [Audio Gap]

We have lifted the first cargo yesterday. So very positive signs, which is not only good for us, it's good for the country because the country really needs the income from the oil production to recover also economically. What I see is that the ceasefire in the country is, of course, very, very helpful. But we need to see more political progress stabilizing the country, especially sending back any expatriates. So the geopolitical risk is still on a high level, and I think we have to plan for a longer period of months that we are running the production site with the local staff. In the fourth quarter, I think we are going to see a further ramp-up of production in Libya. We have seen a very quick recovery to 0.5 million barrels per day production there. But I think the early steps are quickly done and then the tougher times is awaiting you. I'm afraid we might not see the same pace continuing, but it will be a steadily ramp-up of production in Libya until year-end. And don't force me to look into '21. I think nobody has a really good crystal ball at the moment to talk about next year.

And I think the very last question now, just an info request, once again, [ Julia from Mandel ]. Can you repeat the amount of invested money in Nord Stream 2?

I don't have the precise number...

It was EUR 730 million.

EUR 730 million, is that correct?

EUR 792 million.

EUR 792 million? Okay. That's okay. I just got it from Maggie Moll that she said EUR 792 million, it's a new number. Yes, but please contact Andreas Rinofner. He will give you the precise number.

No, you're right. EUR 730 million. EUR 730 million.

730. I am right and not Maggie. It's the first time in the year that I can beat Maggie Moll. Okay. So EUR 730 million is the right number I mentioned earlier. Okay.

A last look into the mailbox. No more questions. So we are perfectly in time. I can and we can and will conclude this press webcast. Thank you for Mr. Seele.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, for your interest, for your attention and for your questions. And at this point, we want to say good bye, stay healthy. Stay in good shape.