Austrian energy company OMV revealed on Tuesday that its second quarter results were not as good as expected. But, it expressed optimism about its operations.

It was announced in a Tuesday report that the second quarter profit was down 15% to $974 million. Lower sales volumes weakened the second-quarter results.

Chief Executive Officer Gerhard Roiss showed optimism despite not so good performance. He said that drilling off Norway and upstream agreements with the Abu Dhabi National Oil Co have provided a boost to its European activity.

He referred "grow upstream, optimize downstream" to be the mantra for the company. OMV said last month that it would accept a one-time loss of $73 million for the second quarter attributable to write-down of assets related to the Nabucco West natural gas pipeline planned from Azerbaijan.

Falling oil prices and a weaker dollar were amongst reasons cited by the company for a hit in second quarter. Besides, a 20% decrease in clean earnings before interest and taxes to 597 million Euros on reduced sales in Libya, the UK and New Zealand, as well as lower crude prices and a weaker US dollar against the euro, were blamed by the Vienna-based integrated energy company.