Hong Kong's Towngas unfazed by weak mainland natural gas demand growth
Natural gas sales growth expected to slow this year amid China's ongoing economic downturn
Hong Kong and China Gas (Towngas) expects its mainland natural gas sales growth to slow to "almost double-digits" this year from 14 per cent last year, but maintains its long-term plan to invest in cleaner-energy projects to profit from Beijing's battle with air pollution.
Towngas, Hong Kong's sole piped gas supplier and one of the mainland's largest city-gas distributors, expects mainland gas sales to pick up later this year on the back of new property sales after relaxation of certain purchase and mortgage limits, said chief operating officer Peter Wong Wai-yee.
"We will also see growth in gas sales to restaurants using bottled petroleum gas but are now connected to our piped gas network," he told reporters after Towngas' annual shareholders meeting.
"A number of our gas refilling stations have also been completed and are ready to do business ... we are maintaining a target to grow our mainland gas sales by close to double-digit percentage this year."
Towngas' mainland gas sales grew by a "single-digit percentage" in this year's first quarter, and that of the entire mainland gas market was only 4.8 per cent year on year, said managing director Alfred Chan Wing-kin.
According to an HSBC research report, the mainland gas market's year-on-year growth in April slowed further to 2.9 per cent, amid slowing economic growth and worsening competitiveness of state-set natural gas prices vis-à-vis diesel and fuel oil, whose prices have been largely liberalised and have fallen in tandem with oil prices.