Displaying items by tag: Ukraine

Belarus/Moldova/Russia/Ukraine: Tariffs on on imported building materials from Belarus, Moldova and Russia imposed by the Ukrainian government will start on 26 June 2019, according to Interfax. The interdepartmental commission for international trade has set duties of 115% for goods originating in Russia, 57% for goods from Belarus and 94% for goods from Moldova.

Moldova: Rybnitsky Cement plans to challenge the Ukrainian government’s tariffs on building materials from Russia, Belarus and Moldova. The producer recently started exporting cement to Ukraine, according to the Infotag News Agency. About 20% of its export sales go to Ukraine. A 94% duty on goods originating from Moldova has been imposed following an anti-dumping investigation by the Ukrainian interdepartmental commission for international trade. In 2018 the Rybnitsky Cement plant produced about 0.4Mt of cement.

Belarus/Moldova/Russia/Ukraine: The Ukrainian interdepartmental commission for international trade has imposed antidumping tariffs on imported clinker and Ordinary Portland Cement (OPC) from Russia, Belarus and Moldova. It has set duties of 115% for goods originating in Russia, 57% for goods from Belarus and 94% for goods from Moldova, according to Interfax. The tariffs will have a duration of five years. Previously the government had embargoed OPC, alumina, slag, sulphate-resistant cement and similar hydraulic cements, including clinkers, from Russia.

Ukraine/Russia: The Ukrainian government has imposed an embargo on Russian-manufactured cement and plywood in response to Russia’s ban on the entry of Ukrainian goods to the Russian market. The Ukrainian Economic Development and Trade Ministry recommended to the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine that imports be blocked for the following goods: Portland cement, calcium aluminate cement, slag cement, sulphate resistant cement and similar hydraulic cement varieties, pigmented and non-pigmented, finished or clinker, as well as glue wood, lamwood panels and similar materials made from laminated wood.

Ukraine imported an estimated US$17m worth of cement products from Russia in 2018. The latest sanctions follow a block by Russia on goods from Ukraine in mid-April 2019.

Ukraine: Podilsky Cement’s revenue rose by 2.5% year-on-year to Euro92.3m in 2018. It reduced its loss by 25% to Euro16.2m, according to the Ukrainian News Agency. It produced 1.35Mt of cement. The company is a subsidiary of Ireland’s CRH.

Ukraine: Data from the State Statistics Service shows that cement production grew by 23% year-on-year to 1.53Mt in the first quarter of 2019. Production accelerated in March 2019, according to the Ukrainian News Agency. Annual cement production fell by 1% to 8.93Mt in 2018.

Ukraine: Germany’s HeidelbergCement is selling its assets according to sources quoted by Interfax-Ukraine. It is reportedly selling to local investment group Concorde Capital and the deal will be completed during March and April 2019. The building materials local subsidiary, HeidelbergCement Ukraine, has not commented on story. The company operates integrated plants at Kryvyi Rih and Amvrosiyivka and a slag grinding plant at Kamyanske. Its loss rose by 14.4% year-on-year to around Euro14m in 2017.

Italy: Buzzi Unicem’s net sales rose by 2.4% year-on-year to Euro2.87bn in 2018 from Euro2.81bn in 2017. Its cement and clinker sales volumes increased by 4.3% to 27.9Mt from 26.8Mt. Ready-mix concrete sales fell by 3.6% to 11.8Mm³ from 12.3Mm³.

It attributed cement and clinker sales increase to acquisitions in Italy and Germany and good market conditions in the Czech Republic, Poland and Russia. However, poor weather hampered business in the US and a ‘strong’ decrease in business levels was reported in Ukraine. In Italy the cement producer benefited from its acquisition of Cementizillo in the second half of 2017. In Germany it purchased Seibel & Söhne and noted demand for oil well cements.

Ukraine: Data from the State Statistics Service shows that Ukrainian cement production fell slightly, by 1% year-on-year, to 8.93Mt in 2018 from 9.3Mt in 2017. In December 2018 production fell by 19.9% year-on-year to 0.35Mt, according to the Ukrainian News Agency. The country has 15 companies producing cement with a combined production capacity of over 20Mt/yr.

More details from HeidelbergCement this week on its divestment strategy. It has sold its half-share in Ciment Québec in Canada and a minority share in a company in Syria. A closed cement plant in Egypt is being sold and it is working on divesting its business in Ukraine. Altogether these four sales will generate Euro150m for the group. Chairman Bernd Scheifele said that the company expects to rake in Euro500m from asset sales in 2018. It has a target of Euro1.5bn by the end of 2020.

In purely cement terms that is something like seven integrated plants. So the usual game follows of considering what assets HeidelbergCement might consider selling. The group offered a few clues in a presentation that Scheifele was due to give earlier this week at the Commerzbank German Investment Seminar in New York.

First of all the producer said that it was hopeful for 2019 due to limited energy cost inflation, better weather in the US, the Indonesian market turning, general margin improvement actions and sustained price rises in Europe. It then said that its divestments would focus on three main categories: non-core business, weak market positions and idle assets. The first covers sectors outside of the trio of cement, aggregates and ready-mix concrete. Things like white cement plants or sand lime brick production. Countries or areas it identified it had already executed divestments in included Saudi Arabia, Georgia, Syria and Quebec in Canada. Idle assets included depleted quarries and land.

The first obvious candidate for divestment could be the company’s two majority owned integrated plants in the Democratic Republic of Congo. These might be considered targets due to the political instability in the country. However, this is balanced by the potential long-term gains once that country stabilises. Alternatively, some of the plants in Italy seem like a target. The company had seven integrated plants, eight grinding plants and one terminal in 2018.

The presentation also pointed out the sharp rise in European Union (EU) Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) CO₂ emissions allowances, from around Euro5/t in 2017 to up to Euro20/t by the end of 2018. In late 2018 Cementa, a subsidiary of HeidelbergCement in Sweden, said it was considering closing Degerhamn plant due to mounting environmental costs. The group reckons it can fight a high carbon price through consolidation, capacity closure, higher utilisation, limited exports and pricing. It also pointed out that it is a technology leader in carbon reduction projects. It will be interesting to see how environmental costs play into HeidelbergCement’s divestment decisions.

Finally, a tweet by Sasja Beslik, the head of sustainable finance at Nordea, flagged up a few cement companies as being the worst companies for increasing CO₂ emissions between 2011 and 2016. HeidelbergCement was 19th on the list after LafargeHolcim and CRH. Sure, cement production makes CO₂ but it’s far from clear whether the data from MSCI took into account that each of these companies had expanded heavily during this time. In HeidelbergCement’s case it bought Italcementi in 2016. Cement companies aren’t perfect but sometimes there’s just no justice.