Polish energy group Orlen reported higher-than-expected adjusted core earnings on Thursday, helped by a stronger downstream result that overshadowed a net profit miss caused by asset impairments and lower oil and gas prices.
As of 08:49 GMT, the shares were up 2.2 per cent, boosting Poland's blue-chip index WIG20, which rose 0.5 per cent.
"Overall four Q25 was a good period for the Polish energy giant," said Tamas Pletser, an analyst at Erste Group, highlighting the "very strong contribution of refining" in a supportive margin environment.
Orlen's model refining margin spiked in the fourth quarter as sanctions and Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian infrastructure curbed diesel exports.
This downstream boost cushioned a broader commodity slump, with Brent crude falling nearly 15 per cent and gas prices retreating from year-ago highs.
The state-controlled group's earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation adjusted for the value of inventories and impairments, or EBITDA LIFO, declined 15 per cent to PLN12.15 billion ($3.40 billion) in the quarter, but beat analysts' consensus of PLN11.4 billion.
However, Orlen's quarterly net profit of PLN3.13 billion fell short of the PLN4.8 billion expected by analysts it had polled ahead of the result publication. The bottom line was weighed down by net impairment losses of PLN3.34 billion on non-current assets, the fourth-quarter report showed.
This included a PLN2.2 billion impairment in the downstream segment, which includes refining and petrochemical business and "new chemistry", a scaled-down version of Orlen's Olefins petrochemical investment designed to cut costs.
Orlen said it planned capital spending of PLN36.3 billion for 2026, up from PLN32.6 billion last year.
Key projects set to be completed this year include Poland's first offshore wind farm on the Baltic Sea and a gas-fired power plant in the city of Grudziadz in northern Poland.
(Reporting by Rafal Nowak and Marek Strzelecki; Additional reporting by Adrianna Ebert and Anna Jaworska-Guidotti; Editing by Milla Nissi-Prussak)