K-Electric (KE) held its 112th Annual General Meeting (AGM) for FY 2022. The meeting was chaired by Moonis Alvi – Chief Executive Officer, KE who was authorized to chair this meeting by the Chairman of the Board Mark Skelton. The Chairman and KE Board members were in attendance virtually, while KE leadership was present in person.
KE’s operational performance has shown improvement on the back of sustained investments across the value chain. The company’s transmission and distribution losses improved by 2.2 percentage points, closing at 15.3% in FY22 from 17.5% in the previous fiscal year. This reduction also beat the target of 15.95% set by the regulator which is a noteworthy achievement. With capacity enhancement initiatives across the power value chain, KE was able to dispatch almost 20 billion units (19,800 GWh) of electricity to homes, offices, and industries across Karachi. In parallel, efforts to inculcate a culture of regular bill payments and engagement with community representatives improved recovery ratios for the company by 1.8 percentage points. Over 200,000 new customers have been added to the network taking KE’s customer base to 3.4 million.
However, these improved operational efficiencies were partly off-set due to the negative impact of additional PKR 9.5 billion recorded this year on account of the Mid-Term Review (MTR) decision, increase in impairment loss against doubtful debts, adverse exchange rate variations and increase in finance cost for the Company. K-Electric’s net profit stood at PKR 8,524 million in FY 2022 as compared to a net profit of PKR 11,998 million during FY 2021 which is 29% lower as compared to previous fiscal year. The Earnings Per Share (EPS) for the year also dipped to 0.31 rupees per share in FY 2022 as compared to EPS of 0.43 rupees in FY 2021.
KE Leadership also shared updates on current and future strategy and plans including the commissioning of the Black Start capability at Korangi Combined Cycle Power Plant (KCCP) achieved during the year, energization of power transformers resulting in capacity enhancement, construction of 500 kV and 220 kV grids to serve as additional interconnections with National Grid enabling KE to increase the off-take from National Grid along with a robust and aggressive investment plan focusing on renewables. However, for these planned investments to materialize, timely approvals from NEPRA and resolution of issues related to KE’s receivables from government entities and departments are critical.