Galp's 41% Q1 Profit Jump Rides the Iran Oil Shock — But the Real Bet Is the Moeve Merger Closing by Mid-2026

Galp's first-quarter print is, on the surface, the cleanest beat the Portuguese energy major has delivered in a year: net profit of €272 million, up 41% year on year, on EBITDA of €943 million, also up 41%. Both numbers fell just shy of analyst consensus (€276 million and €890 million respectively), which is why the share price barely moved on Monday — but the structural story underneath the headline is the part to read tonight.

The Upstream Did Almost All the Work

Galp's exploration-and-production segment generated €685 million of EBITDA, a 78% jump that swallowed the rest of the group's performance whole. Production averaged 129,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day, up 23% year on year, with the FPSO Bacalhau platform off Brazil ramping to plateau. Realised oil prices did the rest: Brent traded around $101 on results day, having spiked to nearly $120 on 9 March after the 28 February US-Israeli strikes on Iran. For an integrated oil company, that combination of more barrels and higher prices is the only quarter you ever want.

Everything downstream is a softer story. Industrial and Midstream EBITDA fell 9% to €198 million, dragged by an estimated €130 million inventory and crude-pricing-formula effect that masked otherwise solid refining margins. Commercial EBITDA rose 37% to €84 million on improved business-to-business conditions in Spain. Renewables — Galp's most-watched segment for any structural read on the Iberian energy transition — posted a €2 million loss as depressed Iberian solar prices continued to compress merchant returns.

Why the Moeve Deal Is the Real Story

Chief executive Filipe Silva used the call to confirm Galp expects to sign the binding agreement merging its industrial and commercial assets with Spain's Moeve by mid-2026 — a deal that would combine roughly 3,500 service stations across Iberia and stitch together the refining and B2B operations of the two companies under a 50-50 joint venture. The negotiations with the Portuguese government are now focused, in Silva's framing, on supply-security guarantees: how a merged Galp-Moeve refining and logistics footprint could remain redundant enough to keep Portugal's fuel grid stable in a future shock.

That framing matters because the Q1 numbers expose exactly the asymmetry the deal is meant to fix. Upstream is what is earning today, but it is also what is most exposed to a Brent reversal. Industrial and Commercial — the segments being folded into Moeve — are the ones underperforming. A combined Iberian downstream platform, with Spanish scale and Portuguese crisis-management leverage, is the bet management is making that the next decade looks less like the past one.

What to Watch Next

• Brent direction: A retreat from the Iran-shock plateau would unwind a chunk of the 41% headline. Galp's earnings sensitivity to Brent is now back at pre-2024 levels.
• Moeve signing window: Silva's mid-2026 timeline puts the binding deal in the second window of the year — around the same time TAP's strategic-partner decision is due. Two of Lisbon's largest corporate files will land at once.
• Renewables drag: The €2 million negative print is small, but a second consecutive negative quarter would force a strategic question on the pace of solar-asset additions in Iberia.
• Namibia campaign: Year-end 2026 exploration with TotalEnergies offshore Namibia is the next upstream catalyst beyond Bacalhau.

For Portugal, the deeper read is that its national-champion oil company has a strong quarter to bank — and a downstream business it is increasingly comfortable handing to a Spanish partner.