Displaying items by tag: Cementos Portland Valderrivas

Spain: French cement multinational Lafarge has reportedly withdrawn from talks that it was having regarding the acquisition of a Catalonian cement plant from the Spanish sector player Cementos Portland Valderrivas (CPV). The decision was attributed to Lafarge's merger project with Swiss cement maker Holcim, which will most probably lead to the sale of assets in European countries, including Spain.

Lafarge had been negotiating the acquisition of the Vallcarca plant for several months. The plant has a cement capacity of 1.3Mt/yr. Lafarge previously placed a Euro20m offer for the facility, which was rejected by CPV.

Spain: Cementos Portland Valderrivas plans to implement a temporary downsizing plan that will affect 620 of the company's 630 total employees. The Spanish cement producer will run the plan for 12 to 15 days, according to news agency Europa Press.

Spain: Spanish association of cement producers Oficemen has appointed Isidoro Miranda as its new chairman. Miranda, the managing director of Lafarge Cementos, will replace the former chairman of Cementos Portland Valderrivas and current CEO of builder FCC, Juan Bejar. Oficemen also named Jaime Ruiz de Haro, Jose Maria Aracama, Feliciano Gonzalez and Jorge Wagner as vice presidents.

Spain: Cement producer Cementos Portland Valderrivas (CPV) is considering the closure of one of its production units in Spain, according to Juan Bejar Ochoa, CEO of the company's majority shareholder FCC. The move looks likely to affect one of the three factories in northern Spain or one of the two plants in Catalonia. Bejar justified the measure by highlighting the 20% decrease in Spanish market demand in 2012. The decision on which unit will be shut down will be taken after analyses of transport and production costs.

Spain: Spanish cement producer Cementos Portland Valderrivas (CPV) has announced that it reduced its loss to Euro147m in 2012 compared to Euro327m in 2011, a 55% year-on-year drop.

The improvement was due to the company's restructuring plan Plan NewVal, which aims to adapt production capacity to the current demand. According to data from the country's association of cement producers Oficemen, cement demand fell by 34% in Spain in 2012.

CPV generated a revenue of Euro653.7m in 2012, down by 12.9% year-on-year, and earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of Euro69.8m, a 55% decrease.

Spain/Ireland/UK: On 26 February 2013 Irish buildings materials supplier CRH plc announced that it and Spanish cement business Cementos Portland Valderrivas SA (CVP) had reached an agreement, effective immediately, regarding an asset swap in relation to certain Spanish assets.

CRH will transfer its 26% stake in Corporacion Uniland SA to CPV. In return, CPV will transfer its 99% stake in Cementos Lemona SA to CRH. CRH will also acquire Southern Cement Ltd, a cement importation business, based in Ipswich, UK as part of the transaction. As part of the transaction CRH and CPV will terminate all legal disputes with each other.

Spain: The board of directors at Spanish construction group FCC will propose in the following days the appointment of Juan Bejar CEO to replace Baldomero Falcones who occupied the position for five years, according to Spanish business newspaper Expansion.

At present Bejar is a chairman at FCC's subsidiary Cementos Portland Valderrivas and Globalvia, in which FCC is a partner of Bankia. He was also a chairman at Citigroup Infrastructure Management and CEO at Ferrovial Infraestructuras and Cintra.

The new CEO will take his position in a moment when FCC is focused on a restructuring process, aimed at meeting the fall of the traditional business, the difficulties of the cement subsidiary and Austrian unit Alpine as well as the need to repay Euro1.6bn debt.

The results are in from the European cement majors and the news from the Mediterranean producers is grim. A common phrase found in most of these financial reports was the 'challenging economic environment' in western Europe. Here's what this means.

In Spain, Cemex saw its net sales in its Mediterranean region (consisting mainly of Spain) slump by 17% to Euro1.10bn. Cementos Portland Valderrivas (CPV) posted a loss of Euro83m for the first nine months of 2012, almost 10 times the loss for the same period in 2011. In July 2012 the Spanish cement association Oficement noted that demand had fallen by 60% year-on-year.

In Italy, Italcementi reported a 92% crash in net profit, to Euro17.1m, for the first nine months of 2012, and a drop in revenue of 4%, to Euro3.39bn, for the first nine months of 2012. Buzzi Unicem reported a 21% decline in sales volumes of cement and clinker, and a drop in sales of 15% to Euro430m. Vicat reported that Italian sales across all its business lines were down by 9% for the year.

By contrast, beleaguered Greek producer Titan has finally started to show a (slight) increase in its revenue. It has been able to report a second consecutive quarter where turnover has risen year-on-year. Although Titan's net profit for the same period still plummeted by 96% to Euro2m.

Elsewhere progress of a kind is being made despite the ongoing European slump, mainly due to profitable assets held outside of western Europe.

Lafarge reported that its overall sales were up by 4% to Euro4.39bn in 2012 so far. Yet its income has fallen by 44% to Euro332m and its profits are suffering from its restructuring programme. In western Europe Lafarge noted that cement volumes were down by 11% to 12.5Mt so far in 2012 and that sales were down by 9% to Euro2.43bn.

Holcim reported a 5% increase in overall net sales and a 7% increase in operating profits to Euro1.57bn. In western Europe Holcim's sales volumes were down by 4.6% (like-for-like) to 20.1Mt and sales were down by 6% to Euro3.68bn.

HeidelbergCement reported a 2.5% increase in overall sales but pre-tax profits have fallen by 5% to Euro601m. HeidelbergCement's revenue from its cement business in western and northern Europe was down by 5% to Euro1.3bn. Buzzi Unicem reported overall flat sales at Euro2.15bn but net profit rose by 50% to Euro85m. Despite this Buzzi Unicem reported a drop of 8.5% in Germany.

Vicat reported little change in sales at Euro1.73bn for the year so far. Vicat's financial reporting made it hard to tell how much was lost in Europe but French cement sales were noted as being down by 12%. Cemex's sales volumes were down by 13% in northern Europe, with net sales down by 15% to Euro3.09bn. Italcementi's cement sales volumes in central and western Europe fell by 16.8% to 12.2Mt.

Of the major producers only Lafarge failed to state the obvious in its outlook about western Europe: that sales will continue to decline in 2012 and 2013. If Titan has set the bar for how much more pain the other European producers have yet to face then conditions are likely to get worse. Get ready for even more 'challenges' in 2013.

Spain: Cementos Portland Valderrivas (CPV) has posted a loss of Euro83m for the first nine months of 2012, almost 10 times the loss for the same period in 2011. The negative performance was attributed to the weak demand in Spain, which could not be offset by the activities abroad. CPV's turnover totalled Euro505m, of which Euro253.6m was generated in the domestic market and Euro251.4m came from abroad. Cement demand in Spain fell by 34.6% over the period, while in the company's two main foreign markets, the USA and Tunisia, it rose by 9.8% and 11%, respectively.

Spain: The management of cement producer Cementos Lemona, a subsidiary of Cementos Portland Valderrivas (CPV), has presented a job-cutting plan, which will affect 34 employees at its in plant in Viscaya in the Basque region of Spain. The move is part of CPV's viability plan to adjust production in the current depression in the Spanish construction industry. Employees at Cementos Lemona have met to discuss the plan.