Gazprom CEO Meets Top Business Leader
Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller has had his first face-to-face meeting with a western business leader since the US imposed sanctions on him April 6.
The April 10 meeting in St Petersburg was, unsurprisingly, with one of Europe's key advocates of engagement with Russia, the OMV (and previously Wintershall) CEO Rainer Seele (shown on far right in photo above, photo credit: Gazprom). Both sides discussed "progress of the Nord Stream 2" project, in which OMV is one of five western co-financiers to Gazprom – which owns 100% equity in NS2.
The state-run Russian giant's statement said both companies "addressed the ongoing and future co-operation, noting that after its record-breaking year for Russian gas consumption in 2017, Austria continued to show dynamic growth in the gas demand." It said preliminary data show that Gazprom from January 1 to April 8 2018 supplied Austria with 3.7bn m3 gas, up 77% year on year.
Gazprom noted that the meeting noted the "high reliability of [Russian] gas supplies, including during the peak cold period in Europe between late February and early March, when only Gazprom was able to promptly increase deliveries." Austria has a high capacity for storage, which can be topped up easily by Russian gas during periods of lower demand.
Gazprom shares at the close of April 9 were 4.6% weaker than at the previous (April 6) close. At midday British summer time, they gained 2.6% on the period 24 hrs earlier, but remain lower overall. Gazprom as a company was not targeted by US Treasury sanctions, in contrast to both Russian aluminium producer Rusal whose shares were down 50% at the April 9 close, and to Sberbank, a financier of the Yamal LNG project, which were 17% lower. The CEO of mining group and commodity trader Glencore, Ivan Glasenberg, announced April 10 that he has resigned from his position as a director of Rusal.
Analysts expect limited repercussions on Gazprom's ability to trade and raise finance as a result of tightening US sanctions, but say some firms may 'think twice' about contacts with the company.
Update 2.50pm British Summer Time, April 10: An OMV spokesperson told NGW: "US sanctions do not directly affect Gazprom or OMV. Therefore there [was] no reason for reschedule any meetings" between Gazprom and OMV.