SINGAPORE (Oct 16): The trustee-manager of Keppel Infrastructure Trust (KIT) declared a DPU of 0.93 cents for 3Q18 ended Sept, unchanged from a year ago. This brings 9M18 DPU to 2.79 cents.
Earnings for 3Q18 fell 47.4% to $8.2 million while 9M18 earnings fell 69.5% to $11.6 million mainly due to lower contribution from City Gas due to the time lag in the adjustment of gas tariffs to reflect actual fuel cost, lower revenue at Basslink as a result of the March service outage and higher fair value loss of financial derivative instruments recognised.
Group revenue for 3Q18 was $162 million, bringing total revenue recognised in 9M18 to $465.2 million, 1.9% lower than 9M17.
City Gas contributed the bulk of sales, with revenue coming in at $88.4 million in 3Q18 and $256.3 million in 9M18, were higher than the corresponding periods in the previous year, due to higher town gas tariff as a result of higher fuel prices.
The concessions comprising Senoko WTE, Tuas WTE, SingSpring Desalination and Ulu Pandan NEWater plants contributed revenue of $24 million in 3Q18, marginally lower than 3Q17 of $25.3 million due to lower dispatch at the water plants. The 9M18 revenue of $70.1 million was comparable with last year.
Basslink’s revenue for 3Q18 of A$16.4 million ($16.5 million) and 9M18 of A$41.7 million were lower than 3Q17 of A$19.4 million and 9M17 of A$60.9 million due to the service outage that occurred from March 25 to June 5 as a result of an incident caused by a third party contractor. This impacted cumulative availability, resulting in lower fees earned during that period.
Revenue from Keppel Merlimau Cogen was $33.1 million and $96.3 million for 3Q18 and 9M18 respectively, comparable to last year.
CityNet contributed revenue of $1.1 million in 9M17. There was no contribution this year as CityNet ceased to be the trustee-manager of Netlink Trust with effect from April 13 2017.
Other income in 3Q18 and 9M18 includes insurance compensation recognised in connection with service outage at Basslink.
As for the outage of the Basslink interconnector from Dec 2015 to June 13 2016, Keppel Infrastructure Fund Management says the dispute has been referred to arbitration since the Tasmanian government did not accept the cable failure as a “Force Majeure Event”.
In a related case, Basslink has also referred the non-payment by Hydro Tasmania of full facility fees from Sept 2016 to Aug 2017 to arbitration on Oct 8 after failing to settle the dispute.
Year to date units of KIT are down 13.8% to close at 50 cents on Tuesday.
