The latest quarterly financial results at ELPE (Hellenic Petroleum), a reliable indicator of where Greece’s energy markets are headed as the corporate group is active in the fuel, electricity and natural gas markets, have unveiled a negative picture for the country’s fuel markets and a more favorable one for the electricity and natural gas sectors.

Corporate group member Hellenic Fuels (BP, EKO), reported a virtual stagnancy for the third quarter and nine-month period, whose fuel sales grew by just one percent to 2,616 metric tones). Factoring in the number of fuel stations operated by BP and EKO, ELPE’s retail trading arms, which increased from 1,712 to 1,735 stations, results in an actual market decline.

The overall drop in fuel sales would have been even greater had significant demand increases not been reported in the aviation and shipping fuel sectors.

This trend is reflected by ELPE’s lower sales and adjusted EBITDA, down by 13 percent to 38 million euros.

Contrary to the corporation’s fuel-related figures, electricity sales, through group member Elpedison, nearly doubled during the nine-month period from 111 million euros to 218 million euros, lifting Elpedison from a pretax loss of 21 million euros to a profit of 8 million euros. Production reached 1.75 billion MWh from 552,000 MWh during last year’s nine-month period.

DEPA, the state-controlled Public Gas Corporation in which ELPE holds a 35 percent stake, reported a 38 percent volume-based sales increase. The gas supply company’s EBITDA figure rose to 169 million euros and net profit after tax increased to 60 million euros from 49 million euros.