2021 was an extraordinary year. The team navigated the volatile power and gas markets while executing on our accelerated growth strategy. We created a record high EBIT result of EUR 65.4m, grew all our trading and support teams, and continued our international expansion – all confirming our commitment to growth.
The power and gas markets were characterized by several extraordinary events in 2021. A combination of low gas storage levels and low power production from renewable resources drove prices to extremely high levels and increased the price volatility. In addition, tensions in Eastern Europe added to the risk premiums.
The increased use of renewable resources has created a more unstable production output and a greater need for cross-border trading of power and gas – a core activity at MFT Energy. Every day, we facilitate the distribution of power from renewables and contribute to the optimum use of renewable energy and to efficient markets.
The Robustness of our Platform
In 2021, our highly skilled trading teams succeeded in turning a demanding market situation into highly attractive business opportunities, increasing our traded volume by 170% to 205 TWh. Nevertheless, we are still a relatively small global player, and we have significant room for further growth internationally. We are very proud of the preparedness of our entire organization, the robustness of our platform, and our ability to respond quickly in these challenging markets.
We continued our investments in all parts of our business and platform – significantly improving the strength and efficiency of our organization. Our scalability, measured as our ability to convert gross profit to EBIT, increased to 78% (2020: 58%).
Our financial robustness has been strengthened as well, as MFT Energy’s equity rose to EUR 61.4m at 31 December 2021 (year-end 2020: EUR 9.6m).
Expanding Globally
It requires an extraordinary team effort to navigate in highly volatile markets, while at the same time executing on our ambitious growth strategy in Europe, the USA, Turkey, and in the APAC region. During 2021, we strengthened our global market position further and are now trading in 30 different markets. In Europe, our Gas team expanded into six new markets and is now trading in 14 markets.
Our US Power team leveraged on the successful entry in 2020 and expanded the trading activities to additional states in the USA. We see a significant growth potential in the American market and expect further expansion in 2022 and the years to come. Our Singapore office is now fully operational and running our European night desk. At the end of 2021, we entered the Australian market and expect further growth and expansion in the APAC region in the years to come.
In only five years, we have become a global player, and we have a strong pipeline of potential new growth markets to be explored further in 2022.
Strengthening the Organization
MFT Energy has a dedicated focus on recruiting and developing talented people, and in 2021 we onboarded an additional 35 exceptional colleagues, growing the organization by almost 60% to 87 employees. In addition, we strengthened the leadership team by appointing Christian Pape as CFO.
Our growth journey continues, and we expect to reach a milestone of 100 employees during Q2 2022, all committed to building the most scalable global trading hub. We are aiming to become a leading global player within power and gas trading and at the same time contributing to the green energy transition.
We have become a truly international company with 23 nationalities in our organization working out of 12 countries. Our MFT Workspace approach allows people to work from home, or from another country, and has been warmly received for giving a high level of flexibility and work satisfaction.
Our partnership model offers the opportunity for all MFT Energy employees to become a partner. In 2022, we were pleased to announce that an additional 11 employees had been promoted, bringing the total number of partners to 46.
Managing Volatile Markets
The volatile market situation has continued in 2022, with the war in Ukraine and the geopolitical instability as the main drivers of increasing energy prices. Our long-term strategic goal is controlled growth, and we have adjusted our operating activities and risk management approach to the current market situation. We are well-positioned and have continued the solid momentum in 2022 where profits for the first five months of the year significantly exceeded the profits for the same period of 2021.
We will remain focused on growing our traded volumes, exploring new markets, initiating algorithmic trading to a larger extent, and investing further in our platform and teams.
On behalf of the leadership team, I would like to thank all our exceptionally talented colleagues and our business partners for a strong team effort in 2021 – and I can proudly say: We are committed to growth.
MFT Energy’s annual report 2021 can be found here