MOL Polska, in accordance with its previous announcements, still plans to ultimately achieve the position of the second largest player on the Polish retail market, but estimates that this goal cannot be achieved organically, and it will require the purchase of more than 100 additional stations, CEO Richard told ISBnews Austen.
“We still believe that MOL becoming the second largest operator in the station market is realistic, but it will require the purchase of over 100 additional stations and this goal cannot be achieved organically,” Austen told ISBnews.
He emphasized that it is impossible to determine even approximately the expected date for achieving this goal.
“Someone must be willing to sell these stations first, and the list of potential contractors is quite limited, and the offer must be attractive from a business perspective. At the moment, we are not talking about further acquisitions, we are focusing on the process of rebranding our network,” added the CEO.
Polish fuel market
In his opinion, the Polish fuel market will grow by several percent in 2024.
“I hope that the economy will bounce back, and the more cash in the economy, the better for the fuel market. I expect that over the next 2-3 years, the Polish fuel market will grow at a low single-digit rate. In general, Poland should be a country in which the decline in demand for traditional fuels due to the ongoing energy transformation will occur relatively late,” he said.
He also admitted that MOL was in no hurry with construction electric car charging stations.
“It is not a profitable business in our region for now, although we are aware that this will change eventually. We currently have approximately 200 chargers in the entire MOL Group, and we want to increase this number to 500. Some of them will definitely be built in Poland, but it is difficult to say exactly how many. We will certainly be ready to build chargers on the Polish market when it will be business-wise,” he concluded.
The Hungarian concern MOL operates in the field of crude oil extraction and processing (it has production assets in 8 countries, it also has 4 refineries and 2 petrochemical units). Since 2004, it has been listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange. It had USD 23.11 billion in consolidated revenues in 2022. After acquiring the Polish network of Grupa Lotos, MOL Polska had 481 stations at the end of 2023.
Piotr Apanowicz
(ISBnews)
