The majority BASF-owned company, which has deconsolidated all its Russian-related activities, said the full-year production target was now between 325,000 and 340,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boe/d), lowering the upper end from an April forecast of 350,000 boe/d.
Daily production in the second quarter was 322,000 boe/d, and development activity was up in Argentina and the United Arab Emirates, it said, while also highlighting project development in Norway, Mexico and Egypt.
Capital expenditure in the full year could now range between 1 and 1.2 billion euros ($1.11-1.33 billion) after previously it had been pegged at 1.2-1.4 billion, Wintershall Dea said in a statement on first-half earnings.
Weaker commodity prices for gas and oil weighed on operating profits in the second quarter of 2023, expressed in the oil industry measure EBITDAX (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, amortisation and exploration), which came down 24% year-on-year at 975 million euros.
But the company managed a 30% increase in adjusted net income at 203 million euros, driven by lower effective tax rates.
Parent BASF, which has a 72.7% holding in the firm, is working to exit the company, with a stock market listing remaining the preferred option, having taken a writedown of 6.5 billion euros in 2022 when the Russia business broke away.
Wintershall Dea pulled out of Russia - which had previously grown to account for half its production - in the wake of the war in Ukraine, losing various big assets including a stakes in the Nord Stream gas pipelines.
The company will brief reporters and analysts later on Thursday on the company strategy.
($1 = 0.9015 euros)
(Reporting by Vera Eckert; editing by Rachel More and Stephen Coates)
