BP - Earnings Call - Q1 2025 (Q&A)
April 29, 2025
Transcript
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Welcome, everybody, to BP's first quarter 2025 results call. We'll be focusing today's call on the first quarter performance and the contents of the video that I hope many of you will have seen by now. Let me first, though, hand over to Murray for a few brief opening remarks.
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Thanks, Craig. Today marks the first quarter since we laid out our reset strategy, and we are delivering on our priorities at pace. We delivered strong operational performance in Q1, with over 96% refining availability and more than 95% upstream plant reliability, supporting record operating efficiency. In upstream, we have successfully started up three major projects: Cypre in Trinidad, Raven Infill in Egypt, and GTA in Mauritania and Senegal. That adds 100 MBD of capacity on our target of 250 MBD by 2027. We made six exploration discoveries, including in the Gulf of Mexico, Trinidad, Egypt, and a significant discovery in Namibia. Our customers' business delivered a strong quarter, with the best first quarter since 2020 on an underlying RCOP basis.
Underlying pre-tax earnings met consensus: gas and low carbon missed, primarily due to a weak gas trading result, but we saw strong performance from customers and products, which beat consensus. We recognize and continue to monitor market volatility and are focused on what we can control. We have implemented a $1.5 billion cash flow intervention for 2025. We continue to optimize our investment plans and have reduced CapEx by $500 million in 2025, down to $14.5 billion. Excluding the inorganic payment for BP Bunge, organic CapEx now stands below $14 billion for 2025. With $1.5 billion of completed or signed divestment agreements year to date, we now expect $3-$4 billion in divestments for 2025, with proceeds weighted to the second half. We are also making strong progress with the strategic review of Castrol, with significant interest in the business.
We have made good progress in costs, with underlying operating expenditure down $500 million quarter on quarter. We will provide more detail on cost reductions at two key results points. Finally, as we guided in our trading statement, net debt rose in the quarter, primarily due to the working capital build. However, we expect the majority of that to unwind through the year in a flat price environment. In summary, operations are running well, creating a strong foundation, with our financial results resilient. We have an ambitious growth plan that we are focused on delivering at pace. That is what we need to keep building on quarter in and quarter out. Back to you, Craig.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thanks, Murray. As usual for everybody on the call for Q&A, I'm going to ask you again, please limit yourself to two questions. We've got a number of people on the call today to get through. We will look to close the call by 2:00 P.M., and of course, the IR team is available for any follow-up. With that, let's get started. I'm going to go to the states to start off this morning, this afternoon, and we'll take the first question from Steve Richardson. Steve, good morning. Perhaps Steve isn’t available. In that case, we’ll stay in the U.S. and go to Doug Leggate at Wolfe. Doug, good morning. Doug, we can't hear you either. Maybe the connection.
Jason Gabelman (Analyst)
The connection.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Looks like we've got a bit of audio problems. What I'm going to try and do then, maybe there's a connection problem with the US, we'll maybe come back to the UK. Let's try Josh Stone at UBS. Okay, we seem to be having some audio problems on the Q&A. If everybody on the line can hear me, if you can just hold as we try and rectify the problems. Just bear with us, please. Okay, I'll maybe wait for some emails so we're using the time efficiently. Buybacks. Can you walk through the bridge here, and how much of it relates to Reinvent bp share option plans? I do understand sound may have come back as well.
Hey, this is Madison.
I do understand sound may be back as well. Maybe if we deal with those first two questions.
Jason Gabelman (Analyst)
Fantastic. Take.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Why don't you lead off on those two? Apologies for the sound issues, Tim.
Kate Thomson (CFO)
Yes, will do, Murray. Thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Okay, we're being asked to repeat the two questions from Biraj. First one, trying to unpack the weakness in gas and low carbon. Beyond trading, what is driving the higher non-cash costs? Should we consider this run rate for the rest of the year, or is there a one-off element? The second question was on share count. It went up despite the $1.75 billion buyback. Can you walk through the bridge here and how much of it relates to reinvent BP share option plans? Kate.
Kate Thomson (CFO)
Yeah, thank you. Hello, Biraj. Sorry, I can't hear your voice today, and apologies for these issues. In terms of the non-cash items going through the gas and low carbon energy segment this quarter, quarter on quarter, we've got about $200 million of higher non-cash items. DD&A is higher. We also had the startup of Raven Infill, which was delivered ahead of schedule—a great performance by the team. There were also some positive non-cash items in Q4, which we haven't obviously seen again in Q1. They were unique to the fourth quarter. In terms of the quarter on quarter delta, I think that's a little bit different because of the one-offs that you've seen going through Q4 versus Q1.
In terms of the DD&A rate going forwards, that's probably a decent run rate with regard to the startup of Raven. Turning to share count, the end of the quarter share count reduction was actually slightly down. In terms of the reinvent, I can't break that out for you at this moment. As we've said before, the reinvent options have a six-year vesting period, and it's quite hard to forecast the extent and the timing of which that may impact our share count. I think a lot of it is going to be driven by human behavior with regard to what's going on in terms of the share price and other factors. What I can say is that, of course, we will continue to offset dilution related to employee share plans over time, as we always have done.
Since 2021, we have reduced our total share count by about 22%, and that remains our intent going forward to offset employee share plan impacts over time.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thanks, Kate. We are going to try the lines. We'll take the question from Josh Stone at UBS. Now, Josh, can you hear us?
Joshua Stone (Analyst)
I can hear you. Can you hear me?
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Can. Can you go ahead with your question, Josh? Thanks.
Joshua Stone (Analyst)
Yep. Yep. I'll go ahead. Thanks, Craig. And good afternoon, Murray. Good afternoon, Kate. Murray, in the video, you talked about very strong operational performance this quarter, and I think you should be commended for that. But when I look at your cash flow statement, that strong performance at least doesn't seem to be coming through yet. Maybe just expand a little bit on the difference between your production performance and your cash flow performance and what gives you some confidence that that can actually get better through this year. Some discussion maybe on gas trading and costs would be helpful, but maybe if there's any other line items you think we should be paying attention to that's driving some of that mismatch in the first quarter. Then second question for Kate. I noticed another issuance of hybrids for about $500 million this quarter.
Looks to be sort of Lightsource, but just remind us how you're thinking about the hybrid balance this year and the timing of when you might start to redeem some of these bonds. Thanks.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Yep, Josh, nice to hear your voice. Thanks. Sorry for the technical difficulties this morning, this afternoon. As far as conversion from earnings into cash flow, it's helpful to look at EBITDA, and we continue to provide EBITDA here, so you can see that. I think the principal issue we have in the quarter is obviously a working capital build. That's something we signaled to you both at Capital Markets Day and at the trading statement. We've had a seasonal build in working capital as we fill up our refineries ahead of the driving season and the flying season across 2Q, 3Q, and 4Q. We would expect the majority of that working capital to unwind, and you'd start to see that coming through the rest of the year, assuming a flat price environment.
Regarding gas trading, as signaled, oil performance was average for the week. You'll remember that we aim for a 4% return on a 4% earnings return on trading across the five years, and we have the same aim this year. Very, very volatile trading circumstances in the first quarter. The oil side did well to hit average, and then the gas side caught out a little bit on European regulation changes, and you should expect us to get back to normal on that in the future. You should expect average performance out of us on gas. I hope that helps on cash flow conversion, and we feel confident in our plans to grow cash flow from $8 to 14 billion across the next three years, and it's been a great operational start for the teams. Kate, over to you on the other question.
Kate Thomson (CFO)
Yeah, thank you. I think you also asked about costs, Josh. I think I counted three questions nested in there, but let me quickly talk about costs. Making incredible progress with regard to our $4 billion-$5 billion cost reduction program, very much building on the progress that we started in 2024, where we delivered $800 million of structural cost reductions and $300 million of absolute reductions through the year. Quarter on quarter, we're already $500 million lower in terms of our absolute cost base. That is good progress, and we can talk more on subsequent questions, I'm sure, in terms of how we're getting after this and what more we're going to deliver. Turning to hybrids, yes, you're correct. We did issue $500 million. This is really just bridge financing for us as we think about bringing in a partner in Lightsource bp.
This $500 million of hybrids is only in place until the beginning of next year. They mature in 2026. My overall strategy with regard to hybrids remains completely unchanged from what I said at Capital Markets Day. I do not intend to grow the stack of the $12 billion group hybrids at all. As we step towards each maturity window, we have the first one between June and September this year and the next one in 2026. We will be very thoughtful with regard to our cash flows and whether or not we want to take advantage of the ability to reduce that hybrid stack by up to 10% each year. Obviously, we are capped to a maximum of a 25% reduction on an accumulative basis by the rating agencies, but we will think about that as and when we get to each maturity window, Josh.
Joshua Stone (Analyst)
Got it. Thanks for the comments.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you, Josh. We're going to go back to the US where we tried to start. I just note, Steve and Doug, you were on the call list. I don't see you there again, if you want to try and dial in again, if you've got a question, please do. I'm going to start with Roger Read at Wells Fargo. Roger.
Roger Read (Analyst)
Yeah, good morning. Good afternoon. Hopefully, you can hear me this time.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Yes, we can, Roger. Thank you. Thanks for bearing with us.
Roger Read (Analyst)
All right. Success. I like it. I'd just like to maybe start off BPX. We've had, obviously, commodity prices come down on the oil side. They've remained pretty favorable on the gas side. It's too soon after the late February investor day to announce big changes, but maybe just get a feel for how you're looking at it, how this fits within the range of expectations, and what you would think about in terms of either increasing activity on the gas side, like the Haynesville, or pulling back at all in Eagle Ford or the Permian with oil closer to $60 here.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Yep. Great, Roger. Thanks very much. I'll take those. On BPX, our plans remain unchanged for now. We continue to think about investing $2.5 billion this year. I think we've got nine or 10 rigs active right now across the basins. We'll closely monitor this. If oil price stays low, of course, we'll moderate our plans and switch over into gas, but for now, we plan to keep it pretty tight. Like you, I'm getting somewhat optimistic on gas pricing. The demand for natural gas is pretty high, and production needs to flow, and new drilling needs to start to help that production flow to fill up the LNG plants and to fill up the other demand that's coming through in the US. Our Haynesville position, our Eagle Ford position are well positioned for that, very close to markets and very little differentials.
In time, we think we'll grow that gas position. The drilling inside that gas position right now is not quite the right time, and we'll just keep this tightly under review as we watch what unfolds with the hydrocarbon pricing. Thanks, Roger.
Roger Read (Analyst)
Thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you, Roger. We're going to stay in the US. Doug, I see you managed to rejoin. Over to you, please.
Douglas Leggate (Analyst)
Can you all hear me okay?
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Yeah, yeah. We're good, Doug. We're all sorted.
Douglas Leggate (Analyst)
Excellent. Okay, good. I'm just glad it wasn't a screw-up on my end, but anyway. Murray, I wonder if I could hit the disposal target. You've nudged it up a little bit for this year. Small, obviously, but you've got a big number out there, and it seems to us, at least when we kind of walk through the waterfall of the potential disposal candidates, it seems you could far exceed that $20 billion number. I realize it's very early days, but I wonder if I could ask you to frame how you've risked that number in terms of, is there an upside case and maybe put a range around what that might look like over time?
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Yep. Great. Doug, thanks very much. As you say, we have very high-quality assets, and transactions are not slowing down right now. Obviously, we've got $1.5 billion behind us in the first quarter, which is fantastic. We're upping our range to $3 billion-$4 billion based on the strength we see and the conversations on the retail positions that we're looking at, as well as the refining position. Obviously, we've launched Castrol as well. I feel it's a well-underpinned plan. I can't give you its risk. We'll deliver the $20 billion. We have lots of options around that. I think for now, given that we're only one quarter in, I wouldn't be guiding to upside. I think we just need to start to get more track record on that and see how the process goes. I am very confident in it.
It is a number that we will hit, much like the net debt target is a number we will hit. There is lots of interest inside the assets that we see, especially as interest rates fall here in Europe. They may not be falling in the US yet, but as interest rates fall in Europe, people are looking for yield, and our assets are good for yield. We continue with our strong process. We feel very good about the $20 billion number. We have strong progress and strong interest inside Castrol, and we keep moving forward. Doug, thanks for the question.
Douglas Leggate (Analyst)
Thanks, Murray. I wonder if I could risk a quick follow-up. It's also on BPX. A little selfishly, you recently dissolved the JV with Devon. There seems to be conflicting data out there as to what it means for BPX. I think Enverus had a report out the other day saying you guys got the better side of the deal, but Devon suggests that the capital costs come down dramatically with them operating. I wonder if you could offer your perspective on that and whether it impacts the $650,000 a year target in 2030. I'll leave it there. Thank you.
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Yep. No impact to $650 KBD target for now. We really like the transaction. We got more production early on. That's why it adds more value, and I think that's what you're referencing in the Enverus report that has been put out. Now, I think there's a different philosophy between ourselves and some companies on what you do in the lower 48. Our focus is on creating as much NPV as we possibly can for the dollars we spend, whereas some operators simply focus on cost. That's not what we do. If you look at Enverus and they benchmark us across all of our three basins, we are best in class on NPV per dollar spent. That's about getting more resources for the dollar we spend on a relative ratio. That applies in the Permian, that applies in the Haynesville, and here in the Eagle Ford as well.
I think the principal difference between the two companies is we believe in three strings to capture more resource. I think Devon believes in two strings to minimize cost. They're right. They'll spend less on the wells, on the casing strings, etc. Again, the benchmarking is showing that using the technology we do, manual pressure drilling, insulated drill pipe, and drilling automation, our teams are keeping the cost relatively consistent. I think benchmarking will tell over time who's right on this, and it's very transparent under the US system. We remain confident, given our track record, that we've got a great team. They're doing great work, and we're very, very focused on value for dollars, not just dollars. We love the deal, and we look forward to seeing the results of it.
We shall challenge ourselves on benchmarking to make sure that we continue to be the best in the basins in which we operate in the way that we think about it. Hope that helps, Doug.
Joshua Stone (Analyst)
It does. Thanks a lot, Murray.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you, Doug. We're going to come back to the U.K., and we'll go to Lydia Rainforth at Barclays. Lydia.
Lydia Rainforth (Analyst)
Good afternoon. Two questions, actually, please. On refining and the trading side, if I think about that business, looking at the numbers, about $13 million of operating profit despite what is 96% uptime, and assuming it's a positive contribution from trading, it does still suggest that the refining business is loss-making even with that good number operationally. I guess the question is, is that a concern, and how quickly can you actually get that back to where it should be? I suspect that'll link in a little bit to the cost side. The second one, just around the head of strategy role, and what do you gain from not having that role in place now? How do you make sure you respond quickly to changing circumstances?
I think part of the criticism and so forth has been that the pivot back to what you're doing now didn't happen as quickly as it could have done. Just that idea of how do you make sure that you can pivot that, that you'll send checking that kind of flexibility side of it? Thanks.
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Yeah, Lydia, I think on the head of strategy role, we'll continue to have a head of strategy. The person will just report into Kate. It'll be much more tightly integrated into planning and actuals. That role continues to be very important. I'm just not choosing to have that role on my leadership team. Kate will ably be able to help us navigate all the twists and changes in the external world, and the team will remain in place to help us with that. I think on refining, what would I say? 1Q, difficult margin environments in the Midwest where there was a surplus of gasoline and obviously Whiting as a gasoline-focused refinery. That was very, very difficult pricing inside the Midwest. In Rotterdam as well, diesel oversupply. The pricing inside Rotterdam was quite, quite difficult.
We are seeing these things rebound as we move into turnaround season globally and as demand starts to pick up. I remember 1Q in the U.S. was pretty difficult. There were quite a few storms in 1Q in the U.S. that drove that low demand. We are starting to see the refining's margin lift up now. We have obviously got Atlantic Basin refineries, $1.2 million a day shut in now. We are seeing that start to lift up, and we now think that we are above our planning basis for refining margins. As always, these things are volatile. We will see what happens. At the same time that is happening, we continue with our efficiency and cost journey. We are obviously high-grading the Gelsenkirchen refinery. We continue in those conversations with counterparts, and we have a big cost program across refining that we laid out.
Our overall aim is to improve the profitability of that business by $2 a barrel over the next few years from 25 to 27, and we're well on track with that. I think we were just in an oversupply situation both in 4Q and 1Q, but that now seems to be starting to alleviate itself as $1.2 million a day capacity shuts down and demand starts to pick up as we move into driving season. Hope that helps with you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you, Lydia. We'll turn next to Kim Fustier at HSBC. Kim.
Kim Fustier (Analyst)
Hi, good afternoon, and thanks for taking my question. Firstly, on CapEx, the oil price is about $5 a week now than the $70 Brent you assumed in the CMD in February. You've turned 25 CapEx by about 3%, which seems like the right thing to do. I appreciate there's not much flexibility to reduce CapEx in the near term, but maybe on a 12-month view, would you be able to reduce CapEx further? If so, would you cut CapEx proportionally across upstream and non-upstream businesses? I guess related to that, I've seen that you exited the low-carbon transport business, and you've also canceled another volunteer project. Relative to the CMD in February, does that point to further downside to your transition CapEx guidance? Thank you.
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Yeah, I think, Kim, no change to the overall guidance that we provided at Capital Markets Day. We set a range of $13 billion-$15 billion. You've obviously seen us cut our capital from $15 billion down to $14.5 billion. That's not in any specific business that I'd highlight. It's across the patch. It's about capital efficiency that we see coming through, as well as a few investment choices. None of the two that you mentioned were really impactful inside that capital frame. As far as how we think about this, we're very, very returns-driven. We will be doing whatever makes the most sense for returns as we make these decisions. In the event of an oil or gas price downside on a 12-month basis, we've got a lot of flexibility in our onshore rigs around the world, so we can obviously act on that basis.
Of course, we can always trim CNM refining capital as we need it across the business as well. I think what I'd say is we're being extra careful given what's going on with the macro environment. We've trimmed capital by $500 million. We've accelerated divestment proceeds, so we've added $1.5 billion to the cash flow of the corporation in 2025 in case the macro continues to turn worse. We have optionality to reduce $2.5 billion of CapEx across the group in the event prices go lower. That would obviously challenge long-term growth, so we're not doing that now, but we do have that $2.5 billion, which equates to a further $10 of price downside.
Of course, the last comment I'll make is in the event prices do start going that low, we'll start to see significant deflation based on what we've seen in past cycles, and that tends to pass through quite, quite quickly. We have seen softening in the US rig market and completions market now with the rig fleet down 10%. We're starting to see a bit of softness in the offshore floaters. Let's just see how this unfolds, but we're well prepared for any scenario.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thanks, Kim.
Kim Fustier (Analyst)
Wonderful. Thank you.
Kate Thomson (CFO)
Thank you, Kim. We'll stay in the U.K. and go to Chris Kuplent at Bank of America. Chris.
Chris Coupland (Analyst)
Yeah, thank you very much, Craig. One for you, Kate. Could you walk us through a little bit the restatement and where Archaea has moved from? I remember at the time of the acquisition, this was meant to generate $500 million plus of EBITDA this year, and I'm not sure what I can compare between your prior quarterly reports entirely tallies up. That'd be helpful to understand the movements between downstream and low carbon. Perhaps for you, Murray, you've now signed and published that Kirkuk agreement, but I'm still missing numerical details. Is there anything you can provide to us in terms of handrails, whether it's CapEx statistics, BOE, or IRRs? Thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Great. I'll start off with Kirkuk, and then we'll hand over to Kate for your other question. The government of Iraq will publish the PSA at some moment in time is what we understand. They have not done so yet, so I have to be guarded in what I say, Chris. I hope you understand that I don't want to break any of those agreements. I think the way you should think about this is this will be an incorporated joint Venture where we bring partners into. There will be CapEx on balance sheet for a little bit, but then the CapEx will move off balance sheet as we bring those partners in. That's the first thing to say. It will be a very capital-light investment into Iraq. The terms are much better than the previous rounds.
Remember, we're on the eighth round now of price improvements since the first awards back in 2027 and 2028. I think some of the terms from the eighth round have been published, so you can look at those inside the various different sources, and you'll know that we're doing at least as well as that. The other things that are public that I can talk about is with Rumaila, we only had the oil rights. Now we have both the oil rights and the gas rights, and it's a decent gas price. We'll be very incentivized to help the nation with natural gas supplies, which they're encouraging us to look at. That offers up an entirely different tranche of profitability relative to Rumaila.
I think the other thing to say is that there's price upside inside this PSA that did not exist in the previous tranches as you look back across time. It is pretty profitable. It'll be cash flow positive quite quickly. Volume ramp up. I can't really disclose volume ramp and volume numbers until the PSA is published, and hopefully that gets published, and then I can talk about this more wholesomely. That is just for the $3 billion barrels inside the 25-year agreement we've struck. We also continue to look at exploration optionality underneath the existing five domes. We have some commitments to drill some wells there that will open up new avenues beyond the $3 billion barrels, and I'm sure there's lots of resource there as the source rock is very, very rich.
Of course, we continue to have conversations with them about the surrounding acreage as well and getting more exploration opportunities. We think this is a great investment, and as we get that PSA published, I would look at the last round for now, and then when the new PSA is published, you should be able to model it pretty tightly, Chris. Over to you, Kate.
Chris Coupland (Analyst)
I appreciate that. Helpful. Thank you.
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Hi, Chris. Yeah, on Archaea, we moved it out of the customer and product segment and into the gas and low carbon energy segment. Where we have materiality, we have restated the 2024 numbers to demonstrate the impact of that. With regards to disclosure, we'll disclose annually in terms of EBITDA, as we said we would when we were talking about this back at the Capital Markets Day. In terms of progress, it did well last year. Nine plants online. We've got three online already this year. I think we're expecting eight to ten, and we still continue to expect Archaea to be free cash flow positive by 2026. From our perspective, it's well on track.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Okay, thanks, Chris.
Chris Coupland (Analyst)
Okay, thank you, Kate.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Sorry, Chris, did you have a follow-up there?
Chris Coupland (Analyst)
Very good. I'll circle back later. Thank you very much, Craig.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
No problem. Thank you. We'll jump back to the US, Jason Gabelman at TD Cowen. Jason.
Jason Gabelman (Analyst)
Good afternoon. Happy to be back on the call. I wanted to start on gas and low carbon energy. The tax rate was high across the company, but also in that segment. I was wondering if you could talk about what drove that and what your expectations are on the tax rate for that segment going forward and more broadly for the company. Thanks.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Yeah, I'll let Kate as our next Head of Tax talk about that.
Kate Thomson (CFO)
Thanks, Murray. Yeah, so the group tax rate, the effective tax rate for the first quarter was around 50%. That's higher than it was in the previous quarter and in the previous year in terms of 1Q, largely driven by the composition of our profits. We tend to have higher taxed areas in our oil production and operation segment than we do in either our customer products or our gas and low carbon energy. That's what's driving the effective tax rate. For now, I think it's important to remind people that we haven't changed our guidance for the full year. We still currently expect our effective tax rate to be around 40%.
Okay. Can you say something specifically about gas and low carbon energy? It looks like 1Q tax rate for that segment was 47%. It's been around 30% the past couple of years.
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Yeah, I think we'll follow up with you separately on that. We don't disclose tax rates by segment, so I'll let Craig and the IR team pick that up with you afterwards if that's okay, Jason.
Jason Gabelman (Analyst)
Okay, that's fine. My follow-up is just on gas hedging, and I believe you had a solid gas hedging program for the lower 48 last year and was wondering if you're doing the same this year, if you could talk about pricing you've locked in. Thanks.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Yeah, we won't be specific. It's a bit commercially sensitive right now, but we'll say the majority of the gas hedges are locked in for BPX. The majority of the production profile is locked in around $4, Jason. So that's what we've got roughly right now.
Jason Gabelman (Analyst)
Okay, great.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thanks, Jason. No problem. We'll come back to the U.K. and take the next question from Martijn Rats at Morgan Stanley. Martin.
Martijn Rats (Analyst)
Yeah, thanks. I've got two as well. I wanted to ask about a few line items that we don't often talk about, but actually in terms of our ability to model earnings and balance sheet gearing are quite important. One is the line about the minorities, which seems to have sort of grown over time. Frankly, it's quite hard to know really sort of what's in there, but any sort of indication, guidance, what the sort of minorities line could report, if current quarter is an indication of what we can expect over the next couple of quarters. Also related to that, the line item sort of adjusting items, which we never talk about. On our end, we always assume that it's zero going forward, but over the last six quarters, it's averaged negative $1.7 billion per quarter.
In terms of modeling balance sheet gearing, this is actually it moves around things sort of quite a bit. To the extent that you can say anything about the line item adjusting items going forward, perhaps not being zero, is there anything you can sort of guide us there? I guess it would help us sort of modeling the balance sheet. Next to these two accounting questions, I've got one specific question about Kaskida. As in my understanding is that the platform forKaskida is on a construction at a yard, I believe, in Singapore. If that platform is imported into the United States, I would suspect that there would need a tariff would need to be paid. I wanted to ask if you can confirm that indeed the importing that platform for that project is subject to an import tariff.
If you can say something about how that might impact the economics of the Kaskida project overall.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Yeah, just to take Kaskida first, finished goods are not subject to tariff, Martin, so I do not think that is a risk at this stage. Nothing we are particularly concerned about. On NCI, I think you were asking a question. I will let Kate tackle that one. Just on adjusting items, I cannot really give you any guidance. There are a million things that flow through there. Fair value accounting effects on hedges on derivatives and such are moved through there. It is quite a volatile set of accounting elements that go through it. You can see it on page 24 of the SEA. I think if I tried to give you guidance on that, I would just get it wrong.
If you think back in history, what's happened there at one moment in time, there were $21 billion of adjusting items in a particular quarter because of the moves on gas prices against the hedges that we had in our LNG trading book, and those eventually evaporated to zero over time. I just encourage you to think about cash flow would be my suggestion because that page of adjusting items is very, very difficult to forecast. It has a lot to do with interest rates. It has a lot to do with oil and gas pricing and the contracts we have in place. Generally, there will be offsets in the underlying business, and it's more of an accounting issue than a cash flow or earnings perspective, which is why we provide the adjustments we do. Kate, over to you on NCI.
Kate Thomson (CFO)
Yeah, thanks, Murray. Hi, Martin. The only other point I'd add on adjusting items is, of course, you get tax items flowing through that as well. This quarter, the pre-tax adjusting items were about $400 million. There was a $500 million adjusting item relating to the extension of the EPL in the U.K. system. That also flows through. Turning to NCI, yeah, look, it tipped up a little bit in this quarter. A lot of that was really due to the fact that we pre-issued around $2.5 billion of hybrids in the fourth quarter. If you could recall back to that, I was explaining that we took advantage of pretty unusually good conditions to issue in advance of upcoming maturities through 2025 and 2026, as did our peers, actually. As a consequence, the costs associated with the hybrids are up a bit.
The bit you can't see is that we chose to take that cash and invest it. And so we are earning interest income on the other side of that, which largely offsets it. In terms of how that's going to look for the next few quarters, as you know, I've just said the first maturity window with regard to our hybrid stack doesn't open up until June. We have the opportunity, if we choose, to reduce by up to $1.2 billion. Let's see when we get there. Unless and until we reduce that hybrid stack, the level of NCI income is going to remain fairly stable.
Jason Gabelman (Analyst)
Okay, thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you, Martin. We'll go next to Michele Della Vigna at Goldman Sachs. Michele.
Michele Della Vigna (Analyst)
Thank you. Two questions, if I may. The first one is on net debt. I was wondering if you could give us perhaps some guidance of where you expect it at the end of the year, assuming flat pricing, given the operating working capital reversal that you expect through the rest of the year. Secondly, I wanted to ask you a broader question on tariffs beyond the Kaskida platform, just whether there is any sensitivity that you guys have done on what could be the impact on your business from tariffs and if there is any part of it which is especially subject to it. Thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Mikele, I'll take tariffs and I'll hand over to net debt to Kate. I think on tariffs, look, so far we haven't seen a material impact to the business. If you think about our American business, we import product from Canada to process in our refineries. That's now been exempted under the US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement. The aluminum and steel tariffs, we're not seeing any impact in our lower 48 business because we took a choice 18 months ago to source all of that steel domestically, so we don't see much of an impact. In the Gulf of Mexico, as we just talked about, there's some specialty steels that we import for drilling and casing, but it's very, very small and it's not going to have a material impact on the business.
I think as I think about the US operations themselves, there's just not much of an impact on tariff, Mikele, at all. Kate, over to you on the question on net debt.
Kate Thomson (CFO)
Yeah, hi, Mikele. I think the first thing I do want to say on net debt is that the target that we've set out of the $14 billion-$18 billion by 2027, I know Murray said it in his opening comments, but I think it bears reinforcing. We're very confident in the delivery of that, and that's what we're really focused on. With regard to the trajectory through the rest of 2025, we've got some big moving parts on there. We've got about, as I look at it, around $2.5 billion. Perhaps a little bit more of the working capital will reverse. If we hit the top of the new target on divestment proceeds, you've got around another $3.5 billion of proceeds coming in from that source. There's some big moving parts on top of the operational performance.
I think I would like to just take a moment to just comment on the way that we're going to tackle our net debt target. If you remember, in February, we talked about ring-fencing divestment proceeds from transactions on Castrol and Lightsource bp. We've launched the process on Castrol. We've got, as you might imagine, great interest in that asset. It's an iconic brand. It's been in place for 125 years. The team are doing a fantastic job for the last few years improving their performance and delivery every single quarter. That's looking strong, and we expect to launch a process on Lightsource bp this quarter. The proceeds from both of those go to bring our balance sheet back into the $14-$18 billion range, and we feel very confident of that.
Thanks very much. We'll take the next question from Matt Lofting at JP Morgan. Matt.
Matthew Lofting (Analyst)
Thanks for taking the questions. Uncertain, could you please, I wanted to specifically first ask you about trading. I think you talked about gas earlier, but I wanted to just ask on oil and liquids. I guess over the last 12 months, BP has generally turned the contribution in the sort of the average to weak range. Optically or on a headline basis, it seems to have coincided with moderated oil and product markets. I wondered if you could just talk about whether there are any key market or spread characteristics that the company would want to see strengthen in order for the contribution of that business to follow suit.
Secondly, on the buyback and $750 for Q1, is there any frame you can share on how BP has thought about the calibration of that $750 for the full year, for example, where at that moment you think is most appropriate to be for 2025 within the 30-40% CFO range? Thanks.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Yep, great. Matt, I'll take the trading question and I'll let Kate take the other question. I think on trading, look, as Carol talked about it, our capital markets day nine weeks ago, our trading is made up of three bits. There's the day-to-day business where we provide customers with energy that makes up about half of our profitability. There's 25% about rediversions when disruptions occur. So 75% of both oil and gas really is all about that base level business that we continue to work away at. On top of that is trading in a speculative sense where we do tend to take time spread positions. I think on that particular bit, the things that make it easier or make it hard, I think headline-driven events, political headline-driven events make it quite difficult to trade.
That is what you saw if you look at the results of the trading houses over the past 12 months. Some of them have outright exited the space as they have dealt with the headlines because they did not have the physical flow that we have. You are just looking to take advantage of spreads over time, whether geographic spreads, time spreads, quality spreads. That is the space where our oil trading book tends to make money. If, Matt, I am afraid if I go any further than that, my traders will get angry with me, so I will stop there and pass over to Kate. Go ahead, Kate, on buyback.
Kate Thomson (CFO)
Yeah, thanks, Murray. Hello, Matt. Yeah, with regard to the Q1 share buyback, at the capital markets update, we suggested that the buyback for the first quarter was likely to be in the range of $750 million to $1 billion. As we think about the buyback each quarter as a board, the first element of the thinking is the way we have now framed our approach to distributions in our new financial framework. We have said that the total of the resilient dividend and the share buyback over time will be around 30-40% of operating cash flow. That is over time. It is not a mechanical quarter in, quarter out calculation. It is a frame for the board to use as a guardrail in terms of how it thinks about it. We have also said it is a mechanism to share excess cash.
At each board decision, as we step through the quarters, we'll, of course, take into consideration what's going on in performance, as well as the frame of 30-40% of ops cash, but also current volatility, outlook medium term across the range of the commodities that drive our cash flow. We're not going to guide forward. We will update you at 2Q when we've stepped through that decision-making process.
Jason Gabelman (Analyst)
Thanks, Beth.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you, Matt. We'll take the next question from Irene Himona Bernstein. Irene.
Irene Himona (Analyst)
Thank you. Good afternoon. I had first of all a question on the $500 million cost reduction in Q1, which I thought was quite an impressive number. You said you will update us in Q2 on costs, but I just wanted to try and understand the type of cost saving we're talking about. Where is it coming from? If you can perhaps give us just a couple of examples to understand. Secondly, Kate, if I may go back to the adjusting items and the $539 million U.K. Energy Profits Levy in Q1, that amount was greater than the full year 2024 amount. Should we treat this as a one-off Q1 event, or is there more to come later this year on this U.K. Energy Profits Levy, please? Thank you.
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Hi, Irene. I'll take the second question first. It's very straightforward. It's purely the tax affecting of the extension of the EPL to 2030, which was substantively enacted in the first quarter. You therefore have to take the full adjustment at that point in time. You shouldn't think that that is recurring. It's all been accounted for fully now. With regard to the $500 million cost reduction, yeah, I'm in a similar place to you. I thought it was a good outcome. It's reflective of the fact that we have the teams in action at pace right across the company. In particular, I think for 1Q, I call out progress in customer and products. I think they're doing very well. Also, we're trimming costs, as I said, across all business, but also in all of the sort of corporate head office functions as well.
We're making good progress. One of the things that we've talked about in the past is our focus on taking out third party and supply chain. We have around 3,000 contractors that have now left BP. We're now going through the next 3,400 contractors roll by roll. We're able to use some technology with the help of Palantir that allows us to go through that exercise and create data-led decision making, as I say, roll by roll on those contractors and move at a pace that we just couldn't doing it manually. We're in action enormously right across the company on that. I look forward to updating in much more detail at the second quarter.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
That's great. Thanks very much. Thank you, Irene. We're going to turn to Lucas Herrmann next at BNP Paribas. Lucas.
Lucas Herrmann (Analyst)
Thanks very much. A couple if I might. Murray, Kate, volumes are in Venture now. I presume that they're flowing. Can you give, and should we assume that you're going to receive broadly a million half tons of LNG this year and start incorporating that obviously in numbers? Just any observations there? I'm going to ask this one. I think it's probably going to be seen by you as a statement of heresy almost. It relates to trading. I mean, it strikes me that for BP and for reestablishment of confidence and trust, increased stability, whatever, within quarterly numbers is of increasing importance. I don't doubt for a moment the competence or the scale of the trading business and your ability historically to generate healthy average returns across an extended period, if not within a short period.
As you say, Murray, and as Carol highlighted, I mean, you have fantastic flows, which should lead to, which obviously drive a sustainable level of margin, albeit obviously vary depending on price. You have a solid ability to optimize. Is this not a point in time where perhaps the organization should think less about value trading and think just more about trying to deliver a stream that is more stable, more consistent, and drives less volatility in the quarterly numbers as it tended to be the way over the last several quarters? You're welcome to shoot me, Murray, but.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Yeah. Yeah, Lucas, I'm trying to think about how to answer your second question. I'll answer the first one, which is quite easy, which is ventures. Yes, it is flowing. It started flowing in mid-April. And we've got 2 MTPA capacity at venture offtake. I think I'll stop describing anything on venture beyond that, on Venture Global. On trading, look, the trading benches are incentivized to make as much money as they possibly can. They take views based on the risk that is out there. If I told them, "Stabilize your income," it really wouldn't be a trading organization. It would be a marketing flow organization. You'd lose an awful lot of, you'd lose an awful lot of edge inside the commercial delivery that we see.
I kind of understand the question, but all trading organizations across the world are highly incentivized to drive as much profit as they can as opposed to partial profit. I understand the volatility points you're making. All I'd encourage everyone to think about is that you should not look at this on a quarter-by-quarter basis, nor should you look at it on a bench-by-bench basis. You should think of it in an annual cycle, in a multi-year cycle. We have earned 4% over the past five years. It has been about half gas. It has been about half oil. Of course, you should divide that in four as you estimate it. We continue to have a strong track record of delivering that 4% no matter what the macro environment conditions are. I think that's my response, Lucas. Thank you for the challenge.
Lucas Herrmann (Analyst)
Thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thanks, Lucas. We'll go next to Henry Tarr at Berenberg. Henry?
Henry Tarr (Analyst)
Hi there, Craig. Hi, everybody. Thanks for taking my question. I guess we had some positive news in Namibia over the last few days with Azule. What are your plans from here in Namibia, I guess? Would you be interested in getting more exposure to the region if the right opportunity came up? Thanks.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Great. Thanks, Henry. Yeah, it was a significant discovery that our partner, Galp Energia, we operate through the Azule joint venture, our 50/50 joint venture with Eni. We're very pleased with the well. It was a significant discovery. They did an extended well test on it and obviously produced 10 KBD of light sweet oil as they did that. We're currently evaluating the results from the drill stem test and thinking about what the next steps forwards are with our partners. I think it's premature to say anything more than that other than we're very pleased with it. As far as would we do more in Namibia, we're always looking for interesting exploration acreage around the world, and it's possible. Right now, I think we're pretty happy with the position we have and the block we have. We'll update you in due course on that over time, Henry.
Thank you.
Henry Tarr (Analyst)
That's great. Thanks.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thanks, Henry. We'll take the next question from Giacomo Romeo at Jefferies. Giacomo.
Giacomo Romeo (Analyst)
Thank you. Two questions remaining maybe for more clarification. Murray, when you talked about the $2.5 billion reduction potential for CapEx, I'm just trying to understand what you're thinking there in terms of what level of prices would trigger such a reduction. Should we expect that to be more linearly if prices go down, or there's a particular level you have in mind where we would see an acceleration? Second question is on gas and low carbon. I appreciate the color on cost. If I look, though, at the EBITDA, I still find quite low compared to what I get through the model. Just trying to understand around the contribution from energy trading, whether that was in fact positive this quarter, or is there any chance you had actually a negative contribution to the EBITDA this quarter?
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thanks, Giacomo. No, we didn't have a loss. It was a weak quarter, though, a weak quarter, as you signal. On CapEx flexibility, look, we've made a decision to trim $500,000,000 based on the macroeconomic environment. Let's wait and see what happens over the coming weeks. There are some OPEC meetings. We will have to see how the negotiations between the U.S. and Iran unfold. We will have to see how the tariffs unfold as well and what that does to overall demand. We will stay right on top of this, making the decisions we need to make. We have lots of flexibility with the $2,500,000,000 that we talked about. Of course, it will demand decisions on different parts of the business. We are not just an oil company. We have oil, we have natural gas, we have service stations that we fund, etc.
We will be thinking about the different macro environments in each of those if we are to make those decisions. A first step of $500 million and no plans to make further cuts at this stage. We will remain tightly attuned to the marketplace and ensure that we can meet our targets for 2027. Thank you, Giacomo.
Henry Tarr (Analyst)
Thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thanks, Giacomo. We are going to make time to take the last two questions, or sorry, the last two individuals with questions. First of all, Paul Cheng at Scotia. Paul?
Paul Chang (Analyst)
Hi. Thank you. Two questions, please. Murray, in the Gulf of Mexico, the US just had a new rule, the down-hole commissioning. Can you give us some idea that where this new rule you see the most opportunities set in your portfolio and how big are those? Second question is that if indeed the commodity market becomes more challenging, how do you contemplate or that the decision process between reducing your CapEx, which you certainly could, but how about further reducing your buyback? I mean, how do you balance between the two? Thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Go ahead, Kate, on the balance between buyback and CapEx. I'll take the question on Gulf of America.
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Yeah, will do. Thanks. Hi, Paul. The financial frame that we set out in February alongside our reset strategy, I think, was pretty clear in terms of how we think of the order of priority inside our financial frame. The first one, we're very clear, is a resilient dividend. We said that you should expect a 4% increase a year, and that's a floor. After that, balance sheet is our next priority. We are categoric in the delivery of this $14 billion-$18 billion target by 2027. After that, we look at CapEx. We have designed the financial frame in totality to be able to be flexible, but yet ensure we can deliver on our four primary targets. We have a lot of flex in CapEx, that $13 billion-$15 billion range. Then we share excess cash with shareholders.
That is where we have positioned the share buyback in this financial frame as part of our total distributions, which are over time at around 30-40% of operating cash flow. I hope that helps you think how and understand how we think about the prioritization. We are going to protect our balance sheet. Yes, the anchor point for us at the moment as a board is thinking about the operating cash flow and using share buybacks as a mechanism to return excess cash to shareholders. We will step through that quarter by quarter.
Paul Chang (Analyst)
If I ask that to clarify, if that means that even in a lower oil price environment, you're still going to pay out about 30-40%, but not below that range? Because I thought 30-40% is just average for our cycles, right? If we're particular looking at one cycle, should we have a payout lower than 30%?
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Look, 30-40% is over time. Of course, our operating cash flow will move up and down with price. We are not looking at it in a particular quarter. As we step towards the decision as a board at the end of each quarter, we will take into account what is going on inside the company, how we have performed in the quarter, but also, as I said earlier, the sort of medium-term outlook of the prices that drive our cash flow. It is not just oil. It is also gas and its refining margin. We will take into consideration all of that as we make our decisions each quarter. We have been pretty clear. We are not going to be guiding forward on share buyback.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Okay. Paul, on down-hole commingling, I suppose it's really targeted at the Paleogene, where we do see the differential pressures. Obviously, Kaskida will be our first development on that. It is going to take a bit of time. We do not see as much potential right now inside the Miocene, but it is early, and we are continuing to test that right now. It is mainly for us right now, a Paleogene question. Obviously, the Paleogene production comes later in the decade for us. Thanks for the question, Paul.
Paul Chang (Analyst)
Thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Okay, thanks, Paul. We've got the last question. Biraj, you helped us out with the virtual ones at the start. Maybe we can hear your voice now. You've hung on to the end.
Biraj Borkhataria (Analyst)
Hi there. Thanks for taking my question. Just one quick clarification. It's more of a modeling thing, and I'm happy to follow up after. Just to comment, I think Martin asked about the NCI charges. I guess part of that is the hybrid, and part of that, I'm assuming, is the selling of things like TANAP and TAP. Just to comment, Kate, you made around the flip side of that, the higher interest. Presumably, that would result in a lower OB&C charge for the year. I'm just wondering, in that context, why the 2025 guide was still $1 billion. Thank you.
Murray Auchincloss (CEO)
Biraj, the short answer is you're correct on both. Yeah, the NCI is made up of both the charges associated with the hybrid bonds, but also dividends that we pay out of BP subsidiaries where there's a level of the equity held by others. Things like divestments around pipelines fall into that category as well. Sorry, could you remind me of the second question? OB&C, yeah. The interest income, yes, you're correct, is reported inside OB&C. We don't split it out. The other very big component that moves OB&C around is FX, and in particular, movements on various components, including hybrid swaps. You'll see quite a lot of FX volatility. That's the primary element that's driven the quarter-on-quarter change inside OB&C. I can't predict where FX is going to go.
For now, what I look at is my underlying spend and my underlying expectation with regard to cost and income going through the year. At the moment, the guidance feels about right. We will, of course, review that when we get to the second quarter and we look again at the full year.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thank you.
Biraj Borkhataria (Analyst)
Thank you.
Craig Marshall (Head of Investor Relations)
Thanks, Biraj. And thank you, Kate. Thank you, Murray. We're going to close the call there. We've managed to get through all the questions. Thank you for raising them. I'd just like to thank you again for the patience at the start of the call. We'll certainly be looking into what happened there. Very unusual. I think we'll close the call on that note. On behalf of Murray, Kate, and myself, thanks very much for listening and for your interest in BP's results today.
