Hi, everyone, and welcome to the Vår Energi's Q2 presentation of 2024. Today's call is being recorded. For the first part of this call, all participants will be in a listen-only mode. Afterwards, there'll be a question and answer session. To ask a question, please press five star on your telephone keypad. I would like to introduce Head of Investor Relations, Ida Marie Fjellheim. Ida, please go ahead. Good morning, everyone, and a warm welcome to Vår Energi's second quarter and first half 2024 results. The presentation today will be given by our CEO, Nick Walker, and our CFO, Stefano Pujatti. Nick and Stefano will present the results, and we will open up for questions afterwards. I will now give the word to Nick. Go ahead. Well, thank you, Ida, and good morning to you all. I do hope you're all enjoying the summer period. A warm welcome to our second quarter and first half 2024 results presentation. I'm really pleased to report another quarter of good delivery, with strong operational and financial results in line or better than guidance. We're on track to deliver our 2025 growth target and unlock future value, and as a result, we continue to provide attractive and predictable dividend distributions. So let us now look at the highlights for the quarter. We delivered strong operational performance, with production of 293,000 bbl of oil equivalent per day in the first half, which is up the upper end of the guidance range for the period. This is driven by good production efficiency across the portfolio, and we've successfully executed our maintenance programs in the quarter. On the back of this strong operational performance, we continued to deliver good financial results, with CFFO in the quarter of $711 million. Our gas sales strategy continues to realize above-market prices. Production costs beat guidance at $12.4 per bbl in the quarter, and we extended two strategically important long-term gas sales agreements to mid 2036. Vår Energi is one of the fastest-growing E&Ps, and we're on track to deliver on our 2025 growth target and unlock future value. The Balder X project target start-up in Q4 remains, with a sail away decision to be made towards the end of August. At Johan Castberg, the FPSO has left the yard, and the project is firmly on track to start up in the fourth quarter. The Alvheim North and Kristin South projects came online recently. Portfolio optimization continued, with sales announced for our non-core Norne and Balder assets. We announced close-to-infrastructure commercial exploration successes in the Balder and Johan areas. Lastly, we continue to deliver attractive and predictable shareholder distributions. We confirm a dividend for the second quarter of $0.11 per share in line with guidance, which is to be distributed in August. We're providing Q3 2024 dividend guidance of $270 million, the same as for Q2, and reconfirming our full-year dividend distribution guidance of approximately 30% of CFFO after tax. So now, stepping into some of the detail. We're one of the fastest-growing E&Ps, the third-largest oil and gas producer in Norway, and the second-largest exporter of gas from Norway to Europe. A large, diversified portfolio, with interest in over 50% of all producing fields, and of course, the associated infrastructure on the NCS, provides lots of optionality and growth opportunities, which we're working to move forward at pace. We concluded the Neptune Energy Norge transaction in January, and already we've fully integrated the business into Vår Energi. We've aligned the two teams, and from the first of May, we've been working as one team, pulling together to deliver on our strategy and goals. In the quarter, we completed the strategy merger of Neptune Energy Norge with Vår Energi, thus simplifying our business structure. We're making great progress on delivering on the targeted synergies from the transaction of approximately $500 million post-tax over time, with about 25% of this target already realized. Now turning to production. The first half of the year came in at 293,000 bbl of oil equivalent per day, which is in the upper end of the guidance range for the period. Production in the second quarter of 287,000 bbl a day is down compared to the first quarter. This is due to planned maintenance activities that were successfully completed. We also saw strong production efficiency from our operated assets, averaging 93% in the quarter. As I've already said, the Alvheim North project started up in May, and the Kristin South project in July, and both of these developments are producing strongly in line with expectations. You can see that turnarounds will significantly impact the third quarter, where we'll see outages at most of our Norwegian Sea assets. Then you will see growth from our major projects, Johan Castberg and Balder X, both targeted to start up in the fourth quarter. We have one further project to start up during the year, and also a significant portfolio of infill wells being completed. We also announced the sale of our non-core Norne and Balder assets. These deals will close in the second half of the year and have minimal production impact in the period. We've had a great first half performance, and are firmly on track to meet our full year guidance range of 280,000-300,000 bbl per day. So now, looking at our longer term growth outlook, we're set for significant production growth from today's level of around 300,000 bbls per day. Five projects in development, with the main ones, of course, being Balder X and Johan Castberg, will add around 130,000 bbl per day of new production. This means we'll grow to around 400,000 bbl per day by the end of 2025, which we're firmly on track to deliver. With our quality portfolio that has significant upside, we can then organically sustain production at 350- 400,000 bbl a day towards 2030. We will achieve this through, firstly, maximizing recovery and infill drilling in our high quality assets. This adds up to 45,000 bbl a day over the period. Secondly, by moving forward at pace, our portfolio of over 20 early phase projects towards sanction, and also drilling out our exciting near field and high impact exploration program. This will deliver sustainable production towards 2030. Of course, responsible operations are key to our license to operate, and our ambition is to be the safest operator. Overall, we have a good safety and environmental trend, which is generally getting better. However, we're having too many small low-level incidents, which is a strong focus in the organization. You can see in the second quarter, we had a good outturn, with zero material safety or environmental incidents. This performance takes strong focus every day. Our belief is that it's important to position the company for the energy transition, to maintain relevance and investibility long-term, and we're doing just that, and are being recognized for it. We continue to make good progress on emissions reduction, and today we're already in the top quartile of industry performance. We have a clear path to over 50% operational emissions reduction from our portfolio by 2030. The three main levers to achieve this are electrification of our assets, energy management, and portfolio optimization, and we're making progress on all of these. Already, around 35% of our production is produced with power from shore. And we're involved in five electrification projects, so by 2030, our aim is that around 70% of our production will be electrified. And on methane emissions, we're doing really great, with performance well below the near zero classification. And so our performance on ESG is being recognized, with the leading ratings that you can see listed here, and our recent inclusion in the Oslo Stock Exchange Index, ESG Index, as the only oil and gas company included in that index. And so now, onto production costs. We beat guidance with $12.2 per bbl in the first half of 2024, compared to our full year guidance of $13.5-$14.5 per bbl. You can see we're currently running about two dollars per bbl below 2023 levels, where two factors are the main contributors. One is the lower cost Neptune assets, which is bringing the overall company cost down as expected, and the rest is the increase in production compared to 2023 levels. Our improvement initiatives are also starting to deliver results. So as a result, for the full year 2024, we now expect the outturn to be at the bottom of the $13.5-$14.5 per bbl guidance range. Looking forward, our target is to reduce unit OpEx to around $10 per bbl by the end of 2025, as you can see on the chart, with the main levers of this being, firstly, the new projects coming on stream, which have average OpEx of around $4 per bbl. Secondly, high-grading the portfolio, which we're making progress on, and thirdly, delivering cost synergies and improvements, which is a strong focus across our organization. So now, moving on to how we're going to deliver long-term growth and value creation. Vår Energi has an amazing portfolio, with lots of optionality and growth opportunities. You can see here that our 2P reserves stand at 1.24 billion bbl. Seven projects come on stream over the next few years, which underpins our growth trajectory. You can also see our contingent resources stand at 750 million bbl, where we've already identified over 20 early phase projects to turn approximately 60% of this resource into value. You should expect to see some project sanctions coming forward during 2025, with the more significant projects being Fram Sør, a Gjøa area development including Gjøa North, Ofelia, Kyrre, and Cerisa, and a Balder Phase VI project, and there are others. On top of that, we have an exciting exploration portfolio of over 1 billion bbls of net risk resources, where we will drill around 60 wells over the next four years. As we'll see later, this program is already adding value. Putting all this together, we have over 3 billion bbl of resource potential in the portfolio, and it is this that which will organically sustain our production towards 2030... So now, looking at our quality project portfolio, which is key to delivering our growth target. After the recent startups of Alvheim North and Kristin South, we have seven remaining projects in execution, which unlock more than 400 million bbl of net reserves. We are well into execution, with five of the seven projects more than 75% complete, so the risks are mostly behind us. You can see this project portfolio creates significant value, with breakevens of around $35 per bbl. If we now then focus in a little bit on our two largest projects, I want to give an update on those. Firstly, Balder X. The Jotun FPSO is a key enabler to continue to deliver future value in the Balder area. This project unlocks gross production of 80,000 bbl a day, and with low operating costs of around $5 per bbl. The status of the Jotun FPSO is that actions taken to increase the pace of the remaining construction and commissioning has yielded results, and the FPSO is now nearing completion. The FPSO mooring system has been redesigned, which reduces the weather constraints for installation, allowing installation into September and earlier in 2025, should installation not happen before the winter period. So startup in the fourth quarter of 2024 remains the target, and a decision on the installation this year will be made at the end of August. Our main consideration here is to ensure we do not carry too much work into the offshore hookup phase, and as previously communicated, risk therefore remains for the installation of the FPSO this year. In the scenario where installation slips to next year, the P90 startup is by the end of Q2 2025. We've created flexibility with the FPSO installation arrangements, giving us full optionality on the timing of making the decision on when to install. If we look at the other elements of the project, they are largely complete. All subsea facilities are installed, and all that now remains is to connect up the FPSO. All 14 planned production wells have been drilled and completed, with results in line with expectations. The final well, a water injector, is just completing, and the drilling rig will demobilize very shortly. If first oil moves to 2025, it will have limited impact on the company's 2024 production, and as the project is nearing completion, this is principally a schedule issue and does not have a material impact on overall company guided costs. It would also not have no impact on delivering the company's growth target of around 400,000 bbl a day by the end of 2025. So completion of the Balder project is in sight, and all our efforts are focused on achieving first oil as soon as possible, importantly, though, in a safe manner and with high quality. And we will communicate an update on the project at the end of August, once we've made a decision on the timing of installation of the FPSO. But this project's more than that. The FPSO also unlocks future growth opportunities. The Balder Phase V project is being progressed. This involves the drilling of six production wells to utilize the remaining subsea template well slots to capture gross 2P reserves of over 30 million bbl, and the drilling of these wells will commence in the first half of 2025 and be completed in 2026. Balder phase VI is being assessed to add new subsea facilities and wells, with sanction of a project targeted in the first half of 2025. Balder X, the Balder X project is nearing completion, and we can now look forward to many years of value creation ahead. Our other major project is Johan Castberg, which is progressing according to schedule and is firmly on track for targeted startup in the fourth quarter. The FPSO is complete and has left the Stord yard for an inshore location for final testing, as you can see in the photo on this slide. In August, the FPSO is expected to be towed to the Johan Castberg field location. All subsea installations are complete, and the drilling activities are going to schedule, with 12 wells already completed. A total of 30 development wells are planned, with drilling activities continuing into 2026. Johan Castberg is a key catalyst for our growth profile. The production capacity of the FPSO has been updated to 220,000 bbl per day gross, compared to the original PDO capacity of 190,000 bbl per day, with Vår Energi's net share of the updated capacity being 66,000 bbl per day. These are high-value bbl, with OpEx of around $4 per bbl and with breakeven economics of $35 per bbl. And we see further upside from extending the plateau through both infill drilling and area tiebacks, where 8 infill wells, 5 producers, and 3 injectors are being planned. And further phases of development are also being planned, being Clusters One and Cluster Two. But on top of that, a series of exploration wells will be drilled over the next few years. We see that this will double the plateau period to 4-5 years, and perhaps beyond. So after years of investment, the true Johan Castberg adventure starts at the end of the year, and we see a bright future with significant upsides and long-term value creation ahead. And so now I'd like to focus a little bit on our exciting exploration program. And to remind you, this year we're planning 16 exploration wells, targeting net risk resources of around 150 million bbl. As you can see, these wells are spread through our four hub areas, and all but 3 wells are close to infrastructure targets. So far this year, we've had a good return from the 6 wells drilled, with 2 commercial successes at Cerisa, in the Gjøa area, and at Ringhorne North in the Balder area. So a 33% success rate to date. Due to these successful results, multiple sidetrack wells were drilled to appraise the 2 discoveries, resulting in us increasing exploration spend for the year to around $350 million pre-tax, from the $300 million previously guided. We're ramping up activity, with 7 wells planned to be completed in the third quarter, and it's going to be exciting to see these results come in. We're also well advanced on defining our exploration program for 2025, which I expect will be even more ambitious than this year's program. I want to now focus on the two commercial successes at Cerisa and Ringhorne North. You can see the location of the Cerisa discovery, only 5 kilometers from the Duva subsea template that is tied into Vår Energi-operated Gjøa platform. Cerisa contains gross recoverable resources in the range of 18-39 million bbl, and we drill 3 sidetrack wells to fully appraise the discovery, so we're ready to move quickly to development studies. This discovery is the fourth in a row in the Gjøa Hub area, with the others being Gjøa North, Ofelia, and Kyrre. Combined, these discoveries have estimated gross recovery resources of up to 110 million bbl. And the Gjøa area development, including Gjøa North, Ofelia, Kyrre, and Cerisa, is commercial as a tieback to Gjøa, where importantly, there's spare capacity, and we're already progressing this on a fast-track basis for a sanction of a project in 2025. Then moving now to the Ringhorne North discovery, which you can see is close to all the Balder area infrastructure. Ringhorne North contains gross recoverable resources in the range of 13-23 million bbl. We drilled two sidetrack wells to appraise the discovery, again, so we're ready to move quickly to development. In addition to unlocking new resources, improving the northern extension of the Ringhorne field, the Ringhorne North discovery also de-risks more drillable prospects in the area. For example, Ghost and Prince Updip, which are candidates for drilling in 2025, and opens up potential development synergies with other nearby Vår Energi-operated discoveries, such as King and Prince and Evra and Iving. Here, there's potential to unlock around 100 million bbl of gross resources in this area, and we're progressing this opportunity on a fast-track basis. So the Balder area is much more than just the Balder X project. And these two exploration successes I've talked about are a demonstration of our consistent and successful exploration strategy, targeting high-value bbls close to existing infrastructure. So that now rounds off my operational update, and I'll now hand over to Stefano to review the financials. Thank you. Thank you, Nick, and good morning, everyone. Now let's deep dive into the key financials for the second quarter and see why Vår Energi is a unique combination of value creation, growth, predictable, and attractive shareholder distribution, underpinned by an investment-grade balance sheet. We generated solid revenues and operating cash flow after tax of $711 million in Q2 on the back of strong operational performance, unit cost below guidance, and good realized prices. Our balance sheet remains solid, with a leverage ratio at 0.8x net debt to EBITDAX and $1.8 billion in available liquidity. We confirmed the second quarter dividend of $270 million, and plan to pay another $270 million for the third quarter of 2024. During the capital markets update in March, we presented an upward revised target of about $500 million identified synergies from the Neptune deal. I'm pleased to say that we have already realized around 25% of this, only five months after closing of the transaction. Some concrete examples of this is the accelerated recovery on Gjøa using Vår Energi contracted vessel. We have been realizing onshore tax benefits and also incorporating Neptune assets in the more competitive Vår Energi insurance package, with lower rates due to increased size of the portfolio. Another example is eliminating external centralized services from the holding in the U.K. and manage them in-house. For the remainder of 2024, we expect to continue realizing further synergies, mainly in the areas of accelerating project developments, harmonizing rig line plans, and integrating Neptune gas volumes in our gas sales strategy. This demonstrates the scale, diversity, and robustness the transaction adds, making us an even stronger pure-play E&P. I will now go into more details of our second quarter financial performance. We generated more than $1.9 billion of revenues, in line with previous quarter. We are up from Q2 of 2023, mainly due to higher volumes. We also continue to deliver good price realizations, and in particular, realized natural gas price, where we had a price realization of around $70 per bbl, which represent a premium of $10 per bbl compared to spot. Realizing above spot pricing has given us additional gas revenues of around $250 million year to date. The realized price for oil in the quarter was $85 per bbl, in line with Brent. Taking a closer look at the gas sales in Q2, around 52% of the sales were on day-ahead basis at $60 per bbl. Around 28% was sold on a month-ahead basis at $52 per bbl. Remaining 20% were delivered under contracts with fixed pricing, realizing an average of $127 per bbl. Going forward, we will continue to have robust sale portfolio with access to several markets, and we will have the flexibility in the contracts to decide the split between month ahead, day ahead, quarter ahead, and fixed contracts. For the third quarter, we will continue to have fixed price sales, representing around 19% of the gas sales for around $132 per bbl. Starting from the fourth quarter, the fixed price exposure will decrease to around 5%, and this is because upon time of nomination for the gas year ahead, we assessed the forward curve to be undervalued. We have therefore chosen to keep our position open and plan to, when time is right, to use other instruments, like fixed price or quarter ahead, to catch window of opportunities when they arise. We target to keep maintaining robust pricing for our volumes, also for the coming gas year. From Q4 going forward, we will also be able to include the Neptune gas in our short- and long-term contracts, which will offer increased flexibility and opportunities to realize additional value. I would also like to mention that our oil production is fully hedged on a post-tax basis for 2024, including Neptune volumes, with monthly put options at a strike price of $50 Brent, and we plan to continue the program going forward also in 2025, where actually we have already covered 100% of post-tax production until end of Q2 2025. Cash flow from operations in the quarter was $711 million, a decrease from the previous quarter, mainly due to the two tax payments we made in April and June, compared to only one in the first quarter. For the first half of the year, we generated more than $1.7 billion of cash flow from operations after tax. Our CapEx, including exploration for the quarter, was $773 million, where Balder and Johan Castberg remained the largest contributor of the total spend and will be the main contributors to reach 400,000 bbl a day by end of 2025. Year to date, CapEx spend, including exploration, is roughly $1.3 billion, and we expect to be within the lower end of guidance for the full year of $2.7 billion-$2.9 billion. Main reason being the weakening of the NOK and also the sale of assets, Norne in particular, which reduces the associated CapEx in the second half of the year. Our resilient and strong liquidity position continued in the quarter. Here, we see the development in our cash position from Q1 to the end of the second quarter. We generated $1.5 billion before tax and working capital movements, aligned with previous quarter. Working capital contributed positively, with more than $100 million as a result of a favorable lifting distribution in the quarter, which allowed a substantial reduction of the trade receivable at the end of the quarter. Tax payments were almost $1 billion, double versus the previous quarter, due to the two tax payments. We further had a cash outflow of $784 million in investment in our high-value growth projects, and we also distributed, as planned, $270 million in dividends to our shareholders. In summary, despite paying in just this quarter $2 billion in tax, dividends, and investments, the cash position at the end of the quarter stood at $350 million, and our available liquidity was at $1.8 billion at the end of Q2, compared to $2.3 billion in the previous quarter. The leverage ratio, net interest-bearing debt to EBITDA, ended at 0.8 at the end of the quarter. This is up 0.1 from previous quarter, but we are expecting Q2 to represent a peak in terms of leverage ratio level in the year, assuming current market conditions, and still well below our over-the-cycle target of 1.3. Our debt portfolio is strong and diversified, with a weighted average time to maturity at 5.2 years when excluding the 60-year hybrid, and this is supporting the execution of our growth strategy towards end of 2025 and beyond. We are maintaining our Baa3 rating from Moody’s and our BBB rating from S&P, both with a stable outlook, and we are committed to maintain our investment grade rating. The strong financial position lays a solid foundation for continued material shareholder distribution and growth, and this is a unique investment proposition that Vår Energi offers. Now, let's look at the tax guidance for the 2024 estimated profits, where 50% will be paid this year and 50% next year. For the second half of 2024, we expect to pay around NOK 14 billion, one installment in the third quarter, and two in the fourth quarter. We have included a tax sensitivity for the first half of 2025, which is giving the cash tax estimates at different price scenarios, where the middle case is giving around NOK 13 billion in total payments. Vår Energi has a strong record of delivering attractive and predictable dividends, and since the IPO, we have returned around $2.5 billion in dividend, and we have paid a stable dividend over the last nine quarters. We confirmed $270 million in dividend for the second quarter, which is equal to $0.11 cents per share, to be paid the 6 of August. The dividend guidance for the third quarter is $270 million, showing the commitment and resilience of the company to attractive shareholder distribution. We maintain our dividend policy between 20%-30% of the CFFO after tax going forward, but with 2024 being in the higher range at approximately 30% of the CFFO post-tax. To sum up, we are well positioned to deliver on our growth and sustained value creation, and we will continue to pay attractive and predictable dividends in the years to come. Finally, I would like to summarize our key 2024 and long-term guidance. For 2024, we are on track to meet our production guidance of 280,000-300,000 bbl a day, which will increase to 400,000 bbl a day by end of 2025. Further, we have a tangible plan to sustain 350,000-400,000 bbls a day until 2030. Production cost between $13.5 and $14.5 per bbl, and we expect to come in at the bottom of the guided range this year as a result of earlier completion of Neptune, which has a lower cost per bbl compared to Vår standalone, NOK devaluation, and cost reductions. This bring us well on track toward our long-term target to bring it down toward 10 by end of 2025. We expect to be in the lower end of our CapEx guidance of $2.7 billion-$2.9 billion in 2024, and from 2025 onward, we expect the CapEx to reduce to around $1.5 billion-$2.5 billion. Exploration CapEx guidance is revised upward to around $350 million, due to the successful discoveries and additional sidetracks on Ringhorne and Cerisa. We will continue to have high exploration activity in the years to come, and we can expect to be in the upper end of the guided range from 2025 onwards. But we will revert with more precise guiding once the drilling schedule is finalized for next year. We are expecting cash tax payments of approximately $1.3 billion in the second half of this year, and we will pay dividend of $270 million relating to Q2, and we guide for $270 million also for Q3. For the year, we expect to pay out approximately 30% of the CFFO after tax in dividends. With that, I hand it back to Nick for concluding remarks. Well, thank you, Stefano. I've just got one final slide to summarize. I, I think the key point is we're delivering on our strategy for growth and value creation. In the first half of 2024, we've continued to deliver strong operational performance in line with or better than guidance. And on the back of this operational performance, and supported by strong realized prices, we continue to deliver good financial results. We're also delivering on our growth target to around 400,000 bbl a day by the end of 2025, and we should be there well before then, as our key projects are nearing completion. And on top of that, we're also unlocking future value with our high-quality portfolio, with significant growth opportunities. We have a pipeline of early-phase projects which we're moving forward now at pace, and our exploration program is already delivering results, and this will allow us to sustain production of 350,000-400,000 bbl a day toward 2030. We're doing all of this with industry-leading ESG performance, which we're getting recognized for. And lastly, we continue to provide attractive and predictable shareholder returns. So these are our second quarter results and other reasons to be invested in Vår Energi. I'd like to thank you for your time, and we'd now like to open up the call for your questions. ... We will now start the question and answer session. If you do wish to ask questions, please press five star on your telephone keypad. If you wish to withdraw it, you may do so by pressing five star again. There'll be a brief pause while questions are being registered. The first question will be from the line of Matthew Smith from Bank of America. Please go ahead. Your line now will be unmuted. Hi there. Good morning, Nick. Good morning, Stefano. A couple of questions from me, if I could. The first one was on Balder X. It sounds like sort of some good progress there. Just looking to really understand, sort of how the confidence intervals have changed since the last quarter, please. 'Cause I think sort of at last quarter, some improvements to the schedule had been made, but ultimately, your comment at the time was that you were tracking behind the schedule. So I'm just want to be clear in terms of, has there been any improvement, on where you're tracking, compared to the prior quarter? So it'd be the first on Balder X, and then the second question, on the dividend, if I could. And it's really around... Could you remind us, you know, you've got a 20%-30% range of CFFO for the dividend. Could you perhaps just remind us sort of what has given you the confidence on, on going towards the 30%, the higher end, of that range this year? And I suppose the question really is, is there any reasons that you would caution us on expecting a similar outturn in 2025? Of course, when your absolute quantum of cash flows should also be higher, as a result of the production ramp. So I'll leave it there. Thanks. Good. Thanks, Matt. I'm Nick here. I'll take the first one, and maybe Stefano will do the second one. And good to have you online, and good questions. I think Balder X, I mean, we've put huge effort into... This is a difficult project. We've put huge effort into moving it forward and getting the remaining construction and commissioning done. And, you know, we've been... We've created some results out of that, and we're now nearing completion on the FPSO. And, you know, we also created some flexibility for ourselves by redesigning the mooring system, which just means that we can install it a bit later towards the winter period and a bit earlier in the spring if it goes to next year. So that's also a good thing to have done and create some optionality. And on top of that, we've put flexibility in all the installation arrangements, vessels, and things, so that we can choose to do it when we want. So we've got the complete flexibility. And, you know, our target is firmly to get it done this year. And we're gonna make a decision as late as possible at the end of August. And the key consideration here is to ensure that we don't carry too much work into the offshore hookup phase. And, you know, as previously completed, communicated, of course, you know, then therefore, there's some risk that we choose to put it into next year. You know, I think we're gonna leave that decision as late as possible, and we'll make the decision at the end of August. Now, if it does go into next year, I think we're very confident of getting this done. You know, it'll get installed in the early part of the spring or maybe in early March, and we'll see first oil at the end of Q2. So, as I say, we're getting there. I mean, the key focus is to just get the remaining work done. And what we're not willing to do is, obviously, compromise on quality and compromise on getting it complete, 'cause what we don't want to do is to take a lot of work offshore. So those are the considerations, and as I say, we're gonna make the decision as late as we possibly can, at the end of August. And then maybe, Stefano, you want to cover the dividend question? Yes, sure. And, you know, on dividend, I think our energy capital allocation priorities, I think provide quite an attractive combination of resilience, growth, and shareholder distribution. And maybe this year, the 30% is a sign of resilience. We are still in quite a CapEx peak phase, where we are funding, especially, you know, for the major part of the year, Johan Castberg and Balder, which are due to start up in Q4. But then, we have... We are entering a new cycle in 2025 with high production and declining investments, which provides headroom for CFFO growth, and for dividend, being the dividend a function of the CFFO. I think, the framework we have allows for a balanced approach to capital allocation, that there is an holistic approach, when we need to prioritize. And, overall, I think, the strength so that you can see in Vår is exactly the fact, the fact that we, we have been able in the past, and also now, and we will do so also in the future, to really combine, to really combine, funding the investments, paying dividends in accordance with the policy, and deleveraging at the same time. So yeah. Hopefully, Matt, gives you some- Thank you very much for your time there. Thanks. Thank you, Matthew. The next question will be from the line of Teodor Sveen- Nilsen from SB1 Markets. Please go ahead. Your line will now be unmuted. Good morning, all, and thanks to take my questions. Three questions from me. First, following up on, on the Balder question. It looks like-... You changed the wording slightly since the first quarter report around, how you talk about the project, and now talk more about, second quarter 2025 than fourth quarter 2024. Just wonder, the past quarter, have your conviction on first oil in Q4 changed anything? That's the first question. Second question is on, the investment program you previously announced. Do you have the line in the morning of the past quarter? I just wonder, are you now done with the divestment program? Third question, is on slide four, on the production indication you give the others. Just wonder on, in the upper range, you, you show for Q4, how much production have you included from Balder and Johan Castberg in that scenario? Thanks. So, good morning, Theodor, and good questions. You know, I think our messaging obviously evolves a little bit from Q1 to now for Q2 around Balder X, but not materially. I mean, the key focus here is to get the FPSO complete. I'm pretty confident we're going to have it mechanically complete very soon, and the question for us is: Do we get enough in commissioning done? And what we're not prepared to do is to take a vessel offshore incomplete, and so that's what the considerations are. We've created more flexibility for ourselves to make the decision later, and if it does go into next year, to get it installed earlier. So all of that is good, and we're just gonna make that decision as late as possible so that we make the right decision, and that's really where it stands. And as I say, if this is, you know, it's not... This is a schedule issue, not really a cost issue, because we're almost complete on the project, and it's also doesn't impact us the long-term guidance for the company, as I said. So that's sort of how we see Balder X. On the divestment program, you know, you'll know that in the quarter we divested the Balder and Norne assets and we continue to look at opportunities to do further things, and of course, we'll let the market know when, if we do something else. You know, we have some other assets perhaps in the portfolio that we might look at divesting in time, but you know, we'll advise when we get to that point if we do, and we'll do it at the right time. In terms of production outlook for this year, you know, we have not guided the details around what's in the range for Q4. I mean, where we are today, year to date, is we're at 293,000 bbl a day to the end of the first half. We're in the upper end of the range that we sort of set out for that period. We see strong underlying production from our assets, and we have a range of outcomes in here for different amounts of production in for Johan Castberg and for Balder in the outlook. And, you know, as both projects come in towards the end of the year, they don't actually have a huge impact on the overall outcome for the year. It's really how do we look into next year. And so there is a component in for those in the outlook, and from the way I see this is that we're firmly on track to deliver our 280,000-300,000 bbl a day for this year, and even if we see little contribution from the two big projects. Hopefully, that covers your questions. Yes. So just on my end and follow up on the last question there. So should we interpret the small increase in production from Q3 to Q4, that is more an issue of less seasonal maintenance than it's an issue of adding bbl from Balder and Castberg, is that correct? Well, we show you a range there, so, and, we show an upside and a downside. And of course, when we get into Q4, we're through all of the, turnaround season, so we should have, good production. We have, of course, the benefit of the infill wells that we've completed during the year. We've brought on, we'll have brought on three new projects by that stage, so we'll be getting the contribution from those. And then we've got, you know, what level of contribution do we get from, Castberg, and Balder X? So they represent the range of outcomes that we show, and I feel, you know, we've got strong performance actually in our underlying assets, so I think we're really in good shape to deliver on our guidance for the year, depending on, you know, regardless of where the projects come in, I think. Okay, understood. Thank you. I'll leave it there. Thanks. Thank you, Teodor. The next question will be from the line of Victoria McCulloch from RBC. Your line now will be unmuted. Morning. Thanks very much, a few questions from me. So could you provide us with a reminder of the Johan Castberg ramp-up expectations? Not necessarily just for this year, as the last question alluded to, but looking out into next year and where we should see it reach the new increased capacity sort of levels. Secondly, in terms of the sanctioning the next phase of projects, it was interesting to hear that we should possibly expect some of these in 2025. What are the biggest challenges in accelerating these projects from where they have been previously? And then finally, hopefully not too stupid a question, what is the implication of taking the Balder X vessel offshore before commissioning is complete to the level that you're trying to get it to? Would that be a cost implication or an operational, risk? Thank you very much. Good. Hi, Victoria, and good questions. On you and Casper, I don't think we've specifically provided guidance on the ramp up, but, you know, the project's on firmly on track to start up in Q4 this year, and that's what we expect, and of course, there's a range of outcomes. And then it takes some time to start up all the wells and clean them up, and then get the stability in the facility, and these things normally take a number of months. So you know, I think you can expect, you know, sometime in the, you know, 3-6 months, you will see a level of stability in the facility, perhaps earlier. And, you know, we, of course, have a range of outcomes in the way we look at our production outlook. So that's sort of how we see that, and... But, you know, the facility's of a high degree of completion. It's very well designed, and, you know, I think all being well, you'd expect a pretty quick ramp up, but, you know, obviously we're cautious around that. Regarding the new projects, it's about just getting them going, actually. I mean, none of these are complicated. They're all tie-backs into facilities we have. The projects activities are ongoing, and it's really about just getting moving and getting these projects sanctioned. All the ones I talked about, I think there's a good opportunity to make them happen and sanction them in the timeframe. You know, there's a lot of predictability around doing subsea tie-backs, and the industry here in Norway has got a lot of capability to do them on time, on cost, and I think we just have to get it done. And then in the Balder question about, you know, the level of commissioning, what we do not want to do is to take a lot of work offshore that, you know, obviously, completing work offshore is more costly and takes more time, and it's more difficult. You know, we have... Today, we have about 1,300 people working on the vessel, and we can't put near that number to work offshore, so... And then, every person offshore costs a lot more money, and then you get weather downtime. So what we don't want to do is to take a material amount of work offshore, and that's the criteria which we will make as far as making a decision at the end of August. I mean, we're basically mechanically complete or very close to mechanically complete now, and the question is: how much extra work can we get done between now and the end of August? And that's what the criteria will be for making a decision. So hopefully that covers your questions, Victoria. Super. Thank you very much. Thank you, Victoria. The next question will be from the Sasikanth Chilukuru from Morgan Stanley. Dilanna, you'll be unmuted. Hi, thanks for taking my questions. I had three, please. The first one was on gas sales. Of course, the proportion of gas sales in fixed prices is falling in 4Q, and now these low levels are extended into 2Q 2025. You've highlighted the forward price at that time were not necessarily attractive. I was just wondering if you could touch upon your outlook for the European natural gas market over the next twelve months, in terms of... and kind of relate to that, to this decision that you have taken on fixed price sales. That would be useful. The second one was on the development CapEx. We'll be coming at the lower end of that range. I was just wondering if you could clarify how much effects kind of contributed to this, if there are any CapEx differentials or, or, well, is this, is this related to the optimization that you've been highlighting about as well? Finally, I'm afraid, the last one is also a clarification on Balder X. The, the sailaway decision at the end of August. Previously, we kind of talked about weather conditions being one of the key factors. I was just wondering if that is still the primary reason or is it the FPSO getting for that installation or getting ready for that installation, the key factor now? If that has kind of changed in terms of how you're kind of looking for uncertainty. Okay, thanks. Maybe, Stefano, do you want to take the first two, and after that, I can talk about Balder. Sure. Yes, absolutely. In terms of gas, we are seeing the gas is trading to around EUR 35 megawatt for the summer, and is increasing to EUR 40 MW for the winter. There is a tightening in general of the global LNG markets, with higher spreads between Asian and TTF. There are concerns about Gazprom stopping deliveries to OMV in Austria due to legal dispute, and there are also supply outages, you know, such as maintenance and operational issues at the NCS and the LNG supply and also in the U.S. So what we are seeing is definitely... And mostly, a new winter will arrive, would be a mild winter, would be a cold winter. So going forward, towards the winter, there is a lot of uncertainty, and for sure, a lot of volatility. So as you correctly said, we didn't opt to lock in at that point in time, fix the price, gas year ahead, or fixed pricing for Q4, and that's the reason why the percentage is 5%, as we showed in the presentation. But this doesn't mean that we don't have the right instruments to address this volatility. Because as a matter of fact, we can still opt to nominate... Quarter-ahead or fixed pricing. If we see that there are interesting level that we come and that we, we judge at that- that we will judge at that point in time, that are attractive to lock in. So, to some extent, I think we have hopefully done the right thing, not to lock in interest that we are not were not looking particularly interesting, and be ready if the window of opportunity comes, to lock in if we see those opportunities coming to the market. And hopefully this will help us to also have a robust gas sales pricing in 2025. In terms of development CapEx, I think you are right. We are guiding on the low range. I would say the weakening of the NOK is the major reason. Let me say, we used an assumptions of NOK 10 per dollar. Today we are at 11, so that is quite an impact. And also, I think it's important to state that our CapEx are 70% NOK-based, and 30% dollar-based. So, you can appreciate that this weakening of the NOK is definitely contributing. Then, I would say the rest is like the asset sale of Norne, or in the second half of the year, you won't have CapEx associated to that one, but I think is contributing, but indeed definitely a lower portion of the total. And then, maybe I'll just capture the Balder projects. I mean, what we've done is one of the things we did is we invested some money to redesign the mooring system and the way it's hooked up. And what that does is it moves work inshore and we had to spend some money on the mooring system offshore, which we've done. And what it does is it means that previously we were able to install towards the end of August and, you know, the winter, the weather period sort of ramps up quite quickly and we needed quite a long period to install the vessel in flat, calm weather. And what this redesign means is that we need less of a flat, calm, weather period, so it creates the opportunity to do it later and earlier in spring. So we can now install in September, as opposed to in August, like the sort of end stop being August. Of course, you can get periods in the winter where you get flat calm long enough, but you know, the frequency and chance of that is very low. And so that, we invested that money, and we've get the opportunity that that offers. And the other criteria is, do we believe we're complete enough to not take a lot of risk offshore, on the vessel? And those are the two criteria that sort of drive this. So that is how I look at this. Hopefully, that answers your question. Thank you very much. That's it. Thank you, Sasikanth. The next question will be from the line of Lydia Rainforth from Barclays. Your line now be unmuted. Thank you, and good morning, and thanks as well for the presentation. A couple of questions, actually. On the safety stats, obviously the TRIF had increased very slightly. I was wondering if you can just talk about that, and then possibly link that a little bit to what you're seeing in terms of the Neptune culture and structure, if you brought those people and assets in. And then I'm actually gonna be very boring and come back to Balder X. If it doesn't go, what are we actually looking at in terms of [audio distortion] You said it can be done quickly and then earlier in the summer window, but when are we actually looking at sail away as the next option, and when does it actually get on stream? Again, it feels like the ramp up of this is, in terms of timing, is minimal. But then linked to that, are there incentive payments for the workforce to actually get it done, at a sail away in kind of early September? Thanks. Good, good, Lydia, and hi, and good questions. On, you know, on the safety statistics, what you'll see from the chart is that we had, I mean, first of all, zero material safety or environmental incidents in Q2. And in fact, when you look back, you know, you can see a very good, strong trend on serious incident performance over time, and actually we're below sort of industry average, somewhat below there. What you see on the TRIF, which is smaller recordable injuries. These are slips, trips, and falls, people cutting fingers or things in eyes, and that type of thing that we record, and of course, we record all of these things, and we're having too many of these. And you can see an uptick in that, and I, you know, there's no specific thing to point at, and we are focused on it hard to try and reduce it, but it's the nature... Yeah, we've got quite a lot of activity going on, and things like construction activity shutdowns and things. So I think this is where it comes from. It's not good enough. We're working to improve it, but having said that, we're about in industry average, actually, in this measure, but it, for us, it's doesn't feel good enough, so we're working on that. And then, you know, you asked a question about culture. I have to say, what I see from the Neptune organization is an extremely strong safety culture, and we have that in our own organization, but today we're working as one organization. We've got everyone together in one place. We've mixed the teams up, the new leadership team's in place, and from 1st of May, we were working on that. You know, I think it feels good already. I think the culture feels good. There's a lot of strong support in the organization for it, and actually, if you look at it from a people perspective, there's lots more opportunities in a bigger company for doing different things, and we've got lots of exciting work to do, and I feel a lot of energy and focus on delivery. And I think, actually, you see that in the results from the company. I mean, we again deliver strong results. You know, everything's either in line or better than what we've guided and, you know, as we sit here, just past the middle of the year, I feel really good for the delivery that we've set out. So, I think the culture's very strong. And then, you know, on Balder X, what we're saying here is that we're nearing completion. We are not going to take the vessel offshore if there's still quite a lot of work to do and the risk offshore. What I'm saying is that we're nearing mechanical completion, and it's really going to be about how much of the commissioning that we have completed, and we'll make a judgment as late as we possibly can on that. You know, we've got, as I said, a lot of people working to get this done. We have definitely incentivized everyone around this, and not just the individuals, but also the contractors to get this done. You know, hopefully, that will help. You know, if we make the decision that we have to move it to next year, I think we will come out at the end of August and clarify, you know, what that looks like. But I think you can expect us to be able to install this around the beginning of March. I don't know whether it possibly could be done earlier. And what I'm saying is the P90 startups by the end of Q2 next year. The reality is, if we end up going to next year, we can guarantee 100% of the work is complete, so we don't carry anything offshore, and that should mean that we end up with a quicker completion when we get there. So those are the considerations, and, as I said, we'll come out at the end of August and give some color on how we look at this. Brilliant. Thank you. Thank you, Lydia. The next question will be from the line of John Olaisen from ABG. Your line now be unmuted. Good morning, and thanks for taking my question. Most of my questions have been answered, but maybe just for curiosity, what in rough terms are the changes you have made to the Jotun mooring system, please? And I got one more follow-up, please. But if you could answer that first, please. Yeah. So what we've done, when the original design... You know, 'cause this is an FPSO that have been installed, so if you were to build it today, you would build it in a slightly different way, and it would have less weather impact on installation 'cause the design was moved forward. So we have what we have, and but what we've done is we've changed the mooring system so that we have to do less offshore. And actually, we move all of the diving work that's required into the inshore period. And so we've invested into some tensioners on the anchor system, so we can tension the anchor systems offshore and do the diving work inshore while it's in the fjord. So what this does is it reduces the period of time we need flat calm offshore to a much smaller period. And then obviously, and we had to spend—It's a relatively small amount of money, but we had to spend some money on the tensioning system on the anchor systems offshore. But that's all installed and ready to go. Hopefully, that's clear, simpler. Yeah, yeah. Perfect. And my follow-up on that is if you could remind us of the Balder X CapEx guidance, and if you'd confirm that it's unchanged, even with all the extra efforts now or in the latter part of the development. And also, if you confirm that that Balder X CapEx guidance is unchanged, even if startup is delayed to Q2 next year, please. Yeah. I don't have in my mind the exact guidance that we've given, so... But, But, but maybe Stefano has that as we, as we talk. And, but what I will say is that, look, you know, we're getting to the end, and so this isn't really a cost issue, it's a schedule issue, and, you know, it does not gonna have a material impact on guided costs on the overall project. And, you know, I think if, we do go to next year, there's possibly a little bit of extra cost, but it's not material, in the overall scheme of the project, is the way I see this. And, and, and again, we will update on this at the, end of August, when we come out with a status on the project. Mm-hmm. Stefano, do you remember the guidance, the latest guidance, please? If not, it's not that important, so we find it, but. Stefano, do you have the total number? I can't... We have not given specific guidance per project, as such. Okay. Okay. All right. Well, thanks a lot, everybody, and have a nice summer. Thank you. Thank you, John. The next question will be from the line of Ruben Dewa from Jefferies. Please go ahead. Your line is now unmuted. ... Hi, good morning, Nick. Good morning, Stefano. Thank you very much for taking my questions, and I think most have been answered, so I hope to do just two quick ones. Just a question on your leverage and the dividend. So the last few quarters have seen a bit of a tick up in the leverage, while you've been able to keep the dividend flat, in a measurable sense, and towards the 30% post-tax payout. I was wondering, would the correct interpretation, therefore, be that you were happy to maintain the flat divvy, and for leverage to tick up, but as long as it's below your long-term net debt to EBITDA target of 1.3x? And then just a second one was on the Balder phase VI. I think you mentioned that it could sanction by in 2025. I was wondering if you could give any color on the impact of this project in terms of potentially extending plateau or additional production. Thank you. Stefano, do you want to try the first one? Yes, probably it goes a little bit to what we said earlier, and, you know, about the fact of having... Currently, we have a leverage, which is at 0.8, and is expected to be a bit, let's say, the highest point, given the current market conditions within the year. And, this specifically was due to the tax payment installments. Now, the dividend level is assessed on quarterly basis, also taking into consideration the commodity environment, the company performance, so is a factor that flows, that comes into the equation. Of course, an important one, but I think what is really important for us, when we look at the leverage, is that we are able to maintain a 1.3 over a cycle. This means that in a specific year, we might be well below, like it happened, we were at 0.3 not long ago. We might be above, but for us, what is really the important thing is that we maintain this 1.3 over the cycle. I don't know if, hopefully, this answered to your question. Yep. That was very helpful. Thank you. Good. And then, Balder Phase VI. So we're in the sort of concept select phase for this project. And, you know, where we're at on the Balder phase V, which I talked about, is six wells, which we'll start drilling in the first half of next year. That will utilize all of the remaining subsea slot, template slots. So, any future developments, what we need to do is install some more subsea infrastructure, so templates and some connections into the facility. And we're at the stage, we have lots of subsurface opportunity here, and we're in the stage of defining what phase VI looks like as a project. So is it how many wells, how many subsea templates? You know, I envisage that we will have multiple phases of development here, and we'll be rolling over template, new templates, over a period of time while we continue to exploit the subsurface opportunity. So it's actually perhaps a bit early to talk about what this looks like, and when we've defined the project more, I think we'll be able to talk about it. So... And as I say, our aim is to come forward with a sanction during next year. Thanks. Thank you very much. Very helpful. Okay. Thank you, Ruben. As no one else has signed up for questions in this call, I will now hand it over to Ida. Thank you very much. We've now run out of time, and investor relations will follow up with the questions that have come in in writing, by email. That concludes the Q2 results presentation. Thank you all for listening in, and we would like to take the opportunity to wish everyone a good summer. Thank you very much.