Higher turnover but lower profit for "Rompetrol Well Services", for a higher turnover

In the first semester of 2010, "Rompetrol Well Services" (symbol: PTR) had a profit of 5.63 million lei, 29.5% lower than in H1 2009, even though the company"s turnover increased slightly to 35 million lei. For comparison, in H1 2009, the company reported a net profit of 7.99 million lei, for a turnover of 34.62 million lei.

"Rompetrol Well Services" is controlled by the "Rompetrol Group", which owns 73% of the company. Shareholders of the company also include investment fund MEI, which holds 5.95%. In the first part of the year, the Kazakhs of KazMunayGaz, the owners of the Rompetrol Group, launched a takeover bid for PTR, and succeeded to increase their stake from 51%to 71.7%. The takeover bid failed because the Kazakhs offered to pay 0.43 lei/share, which caused some shareholders to hold on to their stock.

The total expenses and the total revenues of "Rompetrol Well Services" increased in the first semester. As a result, the company"s revenues increased 2.41%, to 38 million lei, whereas the expenses increased at a higher pace, (+13.12%), to 31 million lei. The company"s operating revenues increased slightly, from 34.72 million lei, at the end of June 2009, to 35.21 million lei, whereas operating expenses increased to 30.89 million lei, from 2.6 million lei, in the first semester of last year.

The company"s financial revenues followed a similar trend, climbing from 2.38 to 2.78 million lei in H1 2010. The company"s financial expenses dropped 83% compared to the first six months of 2009, to 122,707 lei.

The company"s receivables increased 21.97% in the first half of the year, to 52 million lei. "Rompetrol Well Services" did not report any debts due after more than a year, unlike in 2009, when it owed 59,788 lei in that kind of debt. However, "Rompetrol Well Services" reported, for the first six months of 2010, debts in less than one year of 12.9 million lei.

The company has a market capitalization of 94.86 million lei, according to yesterday"s price of 0.336 lei/share.