Writedown by Mighty River Power puts spotlight on Contact plan

Mighty River Power. Photo / Alistair Guthrie.

Cost of quitting overseas ventures contributes to 93 per cent plunge in profit at power company.

Mighty River Power's $69 million writedown on two failed geothermal developments overseas is a lesson for Contact Energy, says an analyst.

Contact is considering investing in geothermal projects overseas which has spooked the market which was expecting up to $1 billion in surplus funds to be returned to shareholders over the next five years.

The big writedown on Mighty River Power's (MRP) Chilean and German ventures, which it had earlier announced it was quitting, contributed to a 93 per cent plunge in half-year net profit to $8 million.

While MRP would not comment on Contact's plans, its chief executive Fraser Whineray said successful overseas investments needed ideal conditions.

"If you want to take renewables internationally you need to have a tremendous amount of capital, a lot of time and very favourable and stable market conditions," Whineray said.

"One example of those changes in market conditions that can affect it ... would have been the change in global energy markets through fracking technology."

Forsyth Barr analyst Andrew Harvey-Green said it would be a harder sell for Contact if it opted to expand overseas.

"From Contact's perspective it makes it more challenging for them to justify the reasons for why they want to go into international geothermal when you have another player in the market who had a reasonable go at it and decided to pull out."

Harbour Asset Management analyst Craig Stent said while Contact's major shareholder, Origin, did have established geothermal projects in other countries, the MRP writedowns would sharpen focus on its plans.

Genesis Energy said it was concentrating on New Zealand.

The company reported a sharply improved net profit and underlying earnings yesterday and its chief executive Albert Brantley said it was content to stay at home in spite of subdued growth in energy sales.

"I think [Meridian boss] Mark Binns said it the best when he said if you're going to go overseas you've got to have something that is quite unique. If you're going to go overseas it has to be unique because you can guarantee that the local guys are going to beat you at it," Brantley said. "That's why we concentrate on doing things locally. We've kept our focus here."

Contact Energy's share price has tumbled more than 11 per cent since Monday last week when it announced it was investigating overseas geothermal ventures, yesterday closing at $6.14c.

Contact would not respond to views expressed yesterday, saying "we're in the early stages of investigating opportunities for where we best leverage our renewable expertise".

Overseas projects prove costly

MRP's Whineray said it was possible the company would recover something from the sale of its Chilean assets and the company's investment in California was successful. It has an interest in a geothermal power station and a minority stake in a geothermal development company but in its financial update yesterday reported a $14 million impairment on the venture.

Both MRP and Genesis shares dropped yesterday following the release of results for the six months ended December 31.

MRP's shares fell 3c to $3.32 after it said full-year pre-tax earnings would be in the range of $480 million to $500 million, reflecting prolonged low rainfall in its Waikato River catchment. An earlier estimate of $495 million to $520 million had assumed average hydrology.

Genesis shares fell 5c to $2.20. It said it was "facing headwinds" on achieving its full-year 2015 prospectus forecast earnings before tax.

Both companies said they would hold the energy component of power bills at present levels over the next calender year. Contact is also holding energy prices for the next year.

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