Displaying items by tag: Argentina

Argentina: Brazilian cement producer Camargo Corrêa is in talks to sell a 40% stake in Loma Negra. The company is exploring a potential sale with an unspecified number of bidders, according to Reuters and Brazil Journal. The proceeds of any successful sale will be used to reduce the debts of InterCement, the holding company that Camargo Corrêa uses to manage assets it purchased from Cimpor. Loma Nega is the largest cement producer in Argentina.

Argentina: Loma Negra, a subsidiary of Brazil’s Intercement, is to spend US$17.5m towards upgrading the baghouse at its Catamarca cement plant in Catamarca province. Work is scheduled to start in September 2016 and continue for 12 months, according to the El Cronista newspaper.

Argentina: Cementos Molins plans to invest US$189m towards upgrading production at its San Jacinto cement grinding plant according to local press. The upgrade will increase the plant’s cement production capacity to 1Mt/yr from 0.3Mt/yr.

It will also create 130 new jobs. The project is expected to last 30 months. Cementos Molins operates in Argentina via its subsidiary Cementos Avellaneda.

Argentina: Cement suppliers in Mendoza province in Argentina have started bringing cement from Chile due to a continued and deepening cement supply crisis. Those that have already been granted permission from the Argentine tax agency to do so are already importing 50kg sacks from the country.

Cement shortages in Mendoza have worsened in recent months. Holcim recently told the local branch of Argentina's construction sector chamber that it was going to be able to resume its normal level of production shortly, after one of its mills was due to be repaired. However, this has reportedly not yet been completed.

Argentina: Cement producers are reportedly facing difficulty with gas supplies that are causing cement shortages, according to iProfessional. Local media reports a 70% fall in cement supply in some locations. Shortages are being recorded in Jujuy, Formosa, Misiones, Santa Fe and Chaco.

Cement shortages have been reported again in western Argentina this week. The story has been simmering over the summer in Mendoza and San Juan Provinces with local construction firms becoming irate with delays to their projects.

The cause is reported by local media to be a broken raw mill at Holcim Argentina's Capdeville cement plant north of the city of Mendoza. Production has been reduced by 2400t/month of cement from the 0.66Mt/yr capacity plant. Unfortunately, cement plants in neighbouring states have lowered their deliveries. Subsequently prices are estimated to have risen by 8 – 10% in July and August 2015 alone..

To put some perspective on the cement shortage, the Cuyo region of Argentina (comprising Mendoza, San Juan and San Luis Provinces) consumed just over 1Mt of cement in 2014 compared to 11Mt for the entire country. However all three provinces in the region are above the national mean cement consumption of 271kg/capita.

Despite the bottleneck in the provinces, the Asociacion de Fabricantes de Cemento (AFCP) recently revised its cement sales forecast for 2015 upwards to over 12Mt, the highest level on record. It attributed the rise demand to public infrastructure projects, house building and the Argentina Credit Programme (ProCreAr). Total despatches to the end of August 2015 were 7.99Mt, a rise of 8.73% or 641,664t from 7.35Mt in August 2014.

This followed a poor year in 2014 when national cement consumption fell by 3.5% year-on-year according to local press. The AFCP reported a fall in production by 4.1% to 11.4Mt.

Notably for the current news story, San Juan Province saw one of the biggest sales drops in 2014 at 10.5%. As InterCement (through its subsidiary Loma Negra) commented in its annual report, the country suffered both a gross domestic product (GDP) contraction of 1% in 2014 and instability in its financial markets that adversely affected consumption. Both the other major cement producers, Cementos Avellaneda (a subsidiary of Cementos Molins) and Holcim Argentina, also reported poor sales in 2014. Under these conditions it is unsurprising that consumers have angered due to localised cement shortages. There should be lots of cement available!

Into 2015, Holcim reported increased cement volumes in the first half of 2015 due to high demand in the Cordoba Province that neighbours Mendoza Province. By contrast, InterCement forecast in its 2014 annual report that it expected sales to remain lower than the high set in 2013. However it also expected continued demand for cement to reflect a response to the economic situation in Argentina with private investors moving to real estate for security.

InterCement and the rest will be monitoring Argentina's economy very closely for the remainder of 2015. Presidential elections are due in October that may change the current scenario. For the moment though the country remains in recession but it has managed to bring in foreign investment. Regardless of this though, the quicker Holcim Argentina and the others address the shortage in Mendoza the better. Demand may not last forever.

Argentina: Cement shortages in Mendoza Province in August 2015 and the beginning of September 2015 has caused complications in terms of house building projects, as well as public and private sector works.

The shortage is linked to a 2400t monthly drop in cement production by Holcim Argentina, as some of its plants are not working properly. Meanwhile, plants in San Juan and San Luis, including Avellaneda, Loma Negra and Minetti, have lowered their deliveries, while investments have not been carried out in accordance with demand, according to construction materials producer Hormiserv. Holcim Argentina's operations in Mendoza are expected to return to normal soon.

Many construction projects will not be completed by 3 October 2015 as planned due to cement shortages, whilst the Procrear housing scheme in Mendoza, which should be receiving 300,000m3 of cement, will only receive 100,000m³, causing delays. In addition, concrete producer Palumbo Hormimac is only operating at 25% of its capacity. Retailers like Materiales Cuyo, which have reported shortages, have estimated that cement prices have grown by 8 – 10% in July - August 2015. Materiales Cuyo, which has not received any cement in September 2015, predicts further price increases in September 2015.

Argentina: Mateo Aleman, the head of the Chaco Construction Company Centre (CEC) has requested that Argentina's national government review the conduct of cement firms Loma Negra and Holcim. He claims that they have been cutting back on cement supplies for several months, in breach of Argentina's Supply Law. According to Aleman, a lack of supply has created a huge price distortions in the market where speculators have been known to double prices, as in the case in the interior of Chaco province.

Argentina: There is a shortage of cement in the San Juan Province of Argentina of around 20% of the normal volumes, according to Esmerk Latin America News. The shortage is blamed on Holcim, which supplies 38% of the cement needed there. Loma Negra and Avellaneda supply 52% and 10% of the material needed in the Argentine district, according to data from the Argentine Construction Chamber. Local ironmongers' believe the problem might be solved shortly.

Spain: According to the Spanish Collection, Cementos Molins plans to invest Euro127m in 2015 to boost its expansion on the markets where it already has presence. Its investments on the Spanish market will stand at Euro10m and its main project abroad will be the construction of a furnace at the San Luis plant in Argentina. Cementos Molins expects a rise in profit year-on-year in 2015. In the first quarter of the year, its consolidated profit was Euro15.1m.