Peru: UNACEM has boosted its first half net income by 23% on higher prices and lower costs, according to Business News Americas.
UNACEM posted a US$47.8m profit and its sales rose by 6% year-on-year to US$896m in the first half of 2015. The company cut its operating costs by 8% in the first half of 2015 and its sales costs by 2.1%. Cement production fell by 1.6% to 2.71Mt in the first half of 2015, while clinker production fell by 6.3% to 2.58Mt. Exports jumped by 36.6% to 590,863t during the period.
UNACEM, which competes in Peru with companies including Cementos Pacasmayo and Gloria Group's Cementos Yura, said that it increased its domestic market share to 51.2% in the first half of 2015 from 49.9%. UNACEM expects to benefit from a growing contribution from its US$553m acquisition in 2014 from Lafarge Ecuador.
UNACEM has 7.6Mt/yr of installed cement capacity. Peru's cement production rose by 1.4% to 10.7Mt in 2014, according to cement producers' association Asocem. Exports from Peru rose by 37.4% to 306,277t in the same period.
