Calling the bottom of the great decline in the Centrica share price is not easy. Punctuated by the occasional brief rally, the shares have been sliding for more than two years. In the autumn of 2013, they fetched more than £4 apiece. They are now perilously close to the £2 mark.
The decline in the wholesale gas price is responsible for much of the damage. A threatened regulatory crackdown hasn’t helped. And the occasional botched project has added to the sense of a company struggling to come to terms with a more hostile world of cheaper energy.
Yet Iain Conn, the former BP group managing director who arrived as chief executive in January, has taken the tough decisions, including slashing the dividend, and is already