Mol to release Q4 results on Friday with significant shifts expected across key segments
Mol will release its preliminary earnings report for the fourth quarter of 2025 on Friday morning. Analysts following the company have already published their expectations for the Hungarian energy group's key figures. In this article, we review the expected performance of the most important business segments and the key factors influencing the results.
Upstream: unsupportive environment
The performance of the Exploration & Production (Upstream) business is fundamentally determined by crude oil and natural gas prices, whilst the volume of extracted hydrocarbons also significantly influences performance.
Although significant price fluctuations occurred in the crude oil market during the October-December period under review, an overall decline was observed for the entire quarter. The average Brent price moderated from USD 68.2 per barrel in the third quarter to USD 63.1, representing a 7.5% decline.
During the quarter under review, the leading narrative in the oil market was still the long-term outlook related to global oversupply, which can be explained by global inventory accumulation, the restart of OPEC+ projects, and production growth in non-OPEC countries. However, a sharp reversal occurred in mid-December, and oil prices began to rise steeply. This can be attributed to the oil market increasingly pricing in geopolitical risks – primarily referring to the potential loss of Iranian oil exports.
Gas prices also saw a decline: during the October-December period, the average price on the Dutch TTF gas exchange was EUR 30.1/MWh compared to EUR 33.2/MWh in the preceding quarter, representing a 9.4% drop in gas prices between the two quarters.
A supply surplus emerged in the European gas market in early 2025, whilst storage levels stood at particularly high levels. Consequently, the environment was characterised by downward pressure on prices, from which only temporary market shocks caused brief deviations. This year, however, due to the extraordinary cold weather, a significant spike has already been seen in TTF.
Therefore, overall, Mol navigated in a significantly moderating oil and gas price environment during the quarter – knowing this, it is not surprising that
analysts expect a much lower result in the upstream business compared to the previous third quarter.
This could represent a 10% decline compared to the base period, with experts expecting EBITDA of USD 249 million in the segment.
(Mol previously signed an agreement with Waldorff to sell its entire Upstream portfolio in the United Kingdom. The figures have therefore been adjusted retrospectively to reflect this as a discontinued operation. The light green figures shown in the charts exclude the North Sea Upstream portfolio.)
Downstream: very, very strong
It remains true that the Hungarian company has access to relatively cheap Russian crude oil. However, it is also true that Mol pays slightly higher costs compared to international benchmark prices for both the quantities arriving from Ukraine via the Druzhba pipeline and the oil arriving from Croatia via the Adria pipeline. Despite all this, the arrival of Russian oil in the fourth quarter could again have provided relatively high margins for the company.
In parallel with this,
refining margins at Mol could have continued to increase in the closed quarter:
between October and December, more precisely from mid-November, both petrol and diesel premiums jumped significantly according to Neste data, although a rapid decline followed. Knowing this, Mol's refining margin likely also stood somewhat higher than in the third quarter.
Given the above, according to expert expectations,
the Refining & marketing (downstream) business segment's result could have jumped by more than 50%.
The analyst consensus suggests a profit of USD 408 million in the segment, which, although lower than the third quarter performance, would represent approximately 53% growth compared to the base period.
Consumer services: decline looms
For the highly seasonal consumer services segment, the fourth quarter typically tends to perform weakly – according to experts, this will be no different this time, as they expect a profit of USD 187 million, which falls well short of the third quarter's record, but still represents significant expansion compared to the base period (+20%).
Conclusion: yes, you may boast
Although the
- unfavourable energy price environment,
- strong margins, and
- unfavourable seasonality of consumer services
will likely not bring a record result overall at Mol,
the expected EBITDA of USD 820 million is very strong indeed and could easily be a cause for pride.
Due to the sideways-moving forint and other items (e.g. interest payments), financial operations may show a loss of USD 7.1 million, whilst the company may have paid approximately USD 47.1 million in profit tax. The main key figures may develop as follows according to analyst consensus:
Cover photo: (c) Fotógyár
