“Nuclear costs won’t topple E.ON”

After a record loss of 16 billion euros, CEO Johannes Teyssen sees his utility E.ON on track to become “a perfectly normal” company again, Helmut Bünder and Brigitte Koch write in Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. Since profits in the power and gas retailing business have dwindled due to fierce competition, E.ON focusses on the more arduous business of tailor-made customer solutions, the authors write. Yet, E.ON’s management “would already be satisfied with last year’s operating profit” before interest and tax, Bünder and Koch explain. According to Teyssen, the utility’s split from fossil spin-off Uniper has been “very straining,” which is why E.ON’s current “dry spell” was likely to persist for “another two years.”

For background, see the CLEW factsheet E.ON shareholders ratify energy giant’s split.