18 January 2018
UltraTech Cement’s profit drops on fuel prices 18 January 2018
India: UltraTech Cement’s profit after tax has dropped in the third quarter of its financial year that ends on 31 March 2018 due to rising costs of petcoke and coal. It also blamed a ban on petcoke usage in some states. Overall, its consolidated profit after tax for the first nine months of its financial year rose by 10% year-on-year to US$3.58bn from US$3.25bn in the same period in 2016. Its profit after tax fell by 10.5% to US$278m from US$311m.
The cement producer said that it had successfully launched the ‘UltraTech Brand’ in all the markets served by the plants it acquired from Jaiprakash Associates in 2017. It reported that production capacity utilisation is at 60% from a low of 18% at the time of the purchase. It is currently appointing new dealers and retailers in its new territories.
Companies reluctant to invest in Egyptian cement industry 18 January 2018
Egypt: The Industrial Development Authority (IDA) has not received any requests for 11 cement plants licenses offered since early 2017. Sources quoted by the Al-Mal newspaper reveal that despite eight local and foreign companies purchasing statements of work by the end of 2017, there has been little interest in the licences.
The IDA offered 14 cement licenses in 2016 to build plants or expand operations in nine governorates. Three licences were sold to SVC, Elsewedy Cement and Egyptian Cement respectively for US$28m in 2016. The remaining licences for Minya, Sohag, Qena, Aswan, New Valley, Matrouh, Suez and South Sinai were re-offered in 2017. Oversupply of cement in the country is estimated to be 30Mt/yr.
Peruvian cement industry finishes 2017 with strong second half 18 January 2018
Peru: The Peruvian cement industry finished 2017 with rises in production and despatches in December 2017. Production rose by 13% year-on-year to 0.898Mt from 0.886Mt and total despatches rose by 1.5% to 0.88Mt from 0.86Mt, according to data from Asociación de Productores de Cemento (Asocem).
Overall, the year couldn’t overcome a poor first half negatively impacted upon by flooding caused by El Niño Costero in early 2017. Production fell by 1.1% to 9.98Mt from 10.1Mt and despatches fell by 1.2% to 9.92Mt from 10Mt. Despite this imports rose by 21% to 0.62Mt from 0.51Mt leading to a slight total increase of despatches and imports.
Azerbaijani cement production increased by a quarter in 2017 18 January 2018
Azerbaijan: Cement production rose by 243% year-on-year to 2.88Mt in 2017. Data from the State Statistics Committee showed that the overall value of building materials produced increased by nearly half to US$333m in the period, according to the Trend News Agency.