The shareholders of Iberdrola have given their approval this Friday, with an average vote in favor of 98%, the re-election of the company’s executive president, Ignacio Sánchez Galán (72 years old), until 2027 and the rest of the points that appeared in the agenda, as well as the income statement for the 2022 financial year. The remuneration of its directors, including that of the president himself —who last year earned 13 million euros— was the block that received the least support, although these were equally in the majority: of 96%.
In the session, held in Bilbao for just over an hour and marked by the absence of questions on some issues that will mark the future of the company —such as the purchase of the American company PNM Resources— Sánchez Galán did refer to the recent agreement reached with the president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, for the sale of 13 gas plants for 6,000 million euros (5,460 million euros). “It is a beneficial agreement for both shareholders [de Iberdrola] as for Mexico and Mexicans, (…) which we have reached after two years of discreet dialogue with the president. We have the full support of the Mexican Government to carry out our work”, he emphasized to the owners of the company. After the pact, Sánchez Galán said, Iberdrola will stop supplying energy to the Federal Electricity Confederation (CFE, the public electricity company of the North American country) but will maintain another 15 generation plants —”fundamentally, renewable generation”— from which it will continue serving electricity to industrial customers.
In his speech before the board, Sánchez Galán anticipated that the company’s profit will “widely” exceed 5,000 million euros, 25% more than in 2022, which had already been a record. This increase, he said, “would allow the dividend to continue increasing” to investors, who this year will receive 0.49 euros per share.
The electricity company, one of the largest in Europe by market value and which in 2022 posted a net profit of 4,339 million euros, has reaffirmed its plans to invest 47,000 million euros in the next three years, “prioritizing financial soundness and investment in areas with a high rating, such as the United States, the EU, Brazil or Australia”. In Spain, investment in the period will be around 6,000 million, “more than in previous years”, he remarked.
The head of Iberdrola has also made an aside to recall that it “will continue to invest” in the hands of three sovereign wealth funds: the Qatar Investment Authority (owner of almost 9% of the capital of the Spanish company and which has been represented on the board by a member of the emir’s family), the Norwegian Norges Bank (owner of almost 4% of its shares and with which it has just closed the sale of half of a large renewable portfolio in Spain) and the Singaporean GIC (which does not have a relevant position in the capital of the electric company, but to which it has just sold 50% of its network business in Brazil).
On a global level, the Chairman of Iberdrola has predicted that the global demand for electricity will double in the next decade, a reality that will make it necessary to undertake “gigantic investments” in an environment of “predictable and stable energy policies”. In this last plane, Sánchez Galán has stated that the “regulatory developments” on both sides of the Atlantic allow the company to “look to the future with optimism”. In the Old Continent, he has said, the electricity market reform proposed by Brussels “will mean more European Union and fewer member state exceptions.”
Asked about the future of green hydrogen, a priority investment niche for electric and fossil fuel companies in recent years, Sánchez Galán described this technology as an “opportunity” and a “new market for electricity” produced by Iberdrola. “We have more than 60 projects in development, and we have presented projects of 3,000 million for European funds. It is a very promising technology and will be a vital element both for decarbonization and for our business.” Unlike what happens in other shareholders’ meetings of Ibex 35 companies, the questions from the shareholders were read by a representative of the management and not by the holders of the shares themselves.
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