Displaying items by tag: Finance

Nigeria: BUA Cement has successfully concluded a US$290m Series 1 fixed-rate senior unsecured bond issue. The Punch newspaper has reported that the company utilised US$290m of its US$505m maiden bond issue in line with regulatory guidelines. It was nonetheless oversubscribed by nearly US$350m. The group said that it will apply to dual-list the bond on the relevant exchanges, subject to necessary approvals.

India: UltraTech Cement has raised around US$137m through unsecured redeemable non-convertible debentures (NCD). It has allotted 10,000 NCDs, each worth US$13,700, by private placement. The NCDs will reach maturity on 29 December 2023.

Belgium: Carmeuse has signed a joint development agreement with France-based energy transition specialist ENGIE and John Cockerill for a carbon capture and utilisation (CCU) project in Wallonia. It will concentrate CO₂ from a new type of lime kiln and combine it with ‘green’ hydrogen to produce ‘e-methane.’ The hydrogen will be produced by a 75MW electrolyser plant powered by renewable electricity. The company said, “The produced e-methane will be suitable for injection into the national natural gas grid. This renewable e-methane can be used by industrial users or as an alternative fuel in the transport sector, thus allowing these sectors to decarbonise.”

Construction is due to begin in 2022 for commissioning of the installation in 2025. Its total investment cost is Euro150m. The partners have applied for funding from the EU Innovation Fund and Important Project of Common European Interest (IPCEI) fund. The project’s estimated CO₂ emissions reduction over 10 years is 900,000t

Chief executive officer (CEO) Rodolphe Collinet said, “We are delighted to join forces with John Cockerill and ENGIE for the development of this very exciting and strategic project. It is a major step forward in our ambition to become CO₂-neutral by 2050. This project is a very concrete and important example of Carmeuse’s strong commitment and contribution to sustainable development.”

India: Birla Corporation plans to raise US$20m through redeemable non-convertible debentures (NCD). It has allotted 1500 NCDs with a value of around US$13,500 on a private placement basis. The producer announced plans in August 2020 for an upgrade to its Durgapur grinding plant in West Bengal.

There’s no single theme this week, just a few news stories of note that may have wider significance.

Firstly comes the news that Semen Indonesia subsidiary Semen Padang has been exporting 25,000t of cement to Australia. This follows a consignment of 35,000t of clinker to Bangladesh. The company is hoping to hit a cement and clinker export target of 1.58Mt in 2020 in spite of the on-going coronavirus pandemic. It reached 1.09Mt (about 70%) of this by mid-September 2020 through exports to Bangladesh, Myanmar, Philippines, Australia, Sri Lanka and Maldives.

The wider picture here is that local sales in Indonesia fell by 7.7% year-on-year to 27.2Mt in the first half of 2020 from 29.4Mt in the same period in 2019, according to data from the Indonesian Cement Association (ASI). Cement and clinker exports are up by 32.8% to 3.7Mt from 2.8Mt. Semen Indonesia’s revenue is down but it has managed to hold its earnings up so far. During press rounds in late August 2020 its marketing and supply chain director, Adi Munandir, told local press that he expected domestic demand to fall by up to 15% in 2020 due to effects of coronavirus on private construction and government infrastructure plans. Analysts reckon that the worst of the demand slump hit in the second quarter of 2020 when government-related coronavirus restrictions were implemented, so Semen Indonesia’s third quarter results will closely scrutinised.

One of Semen Padang export targets is the Maldives. This chimes with another story this week because Oman-based Raysut Cement has just bought a majority stake in a cement terminal from Lafarge Maldives for US$8m. The 9000t capacity Thilafusi cement terminal is located on the island of Thilafusi, Kaafu and was expanded in 2015. Raysut Cement has tended to stick to markets in the southern Arabian Peninsula and the east coast of Africa, with projects planned in Madagascar and Somaliland. Yet expansion plans in places further away such as India and Georgia have also been mentioned publicly. A greater presence in the Maldives is a solid step towards Raysut heading eastwards. This would also mirror the plans of the country’s gypsum sector to dominate African and Asian markets and a general longer term shift in global markets from west to east.

One place west that has been doing well in cement though is Brazil. National Cement Industry Union (SNIC) data for September 2020 show a 21% year-on-year boom in cement sales to 5.8Mt and a 9.4% year-on-year increase to 44.6Mt for the first nine months of 2020. Earlier in the year the country’s limited coronavirus suppression methods were attributed for letting the recovering cement sector grow. Now, SNIC has directly thanked government support for civil construction. However, Paulo Camillo Penna, the president of SNIC said. “The results are surprising so far, but that doesn't give us security in the long run,” due to a bubble of real estate and commercial activity that already appears to be declining. Given the slump in cement demand from 2015 to 2018 it’s understandable that SNIC is taking the recovery cautiously.

And to finish we have two connected stories about Cemex. Following the release of its resilience strategy in September 2020, the company has now declared that its integrated Rüdersdorf cement plant in Germany will be the centrepiece of its CO2 reduction plans as part of ‘Vision Rüdersdorf.’ Details are light at present but we expect some kind of carbon capture and storage or usage project. An addendum to this – or perhaps it’s the other way round (!) – is that Cemex has also just announced further credit amendments but with sustainability-linked metrics. Cemex’s chief financial officer (CFO) Maher Al-Haffar said, “We are especially proud that this transaction represents one of the largest sustainability-linked loans in the world.” The teeth of this arrangement remain to be seen but the integration of finance and sustainability has serious implications generally.

Watch out for a research and development themed interview with Cemex and Synhelion in the December 2020 issue of Global Cement Magazine

Mexico: Cemex says that it has agreed upon an amendment to its facilities agreement to extend US$1.1bn of term loan maturities to 2025 from 2022, and US$1.1bn of commitments under the revolving credit facility to 2023 from 2022. It says that the sustainability criteria incorporated into the interest rates of the facilities agreement, now worth US$3.2bn, make it ‘one of the largest sustainability-linked loans in the world.’ The company adds that it will prepay US$530m to institutions participating in the extension, corresponding to the July 2021 amortisation under the facilities agreement, and extending its debt maturity profile through to July 2023.

The group has also decided to redenominate its debt away from the US dollar. US$313m of exposure under the term loans that are part of the facilities agreement will convert to Mexican Pesos and US$82m will convert to Euros.

South Africa: PPC says that it has extended existing short-term banking facilities with its two primary South African lenders until at least September 2021 and deferred scheduled interest and capital repayments on long-term facilities until March 2021. The company says that it will “enhance its security position through a security pool arrangement” and “reduce the levels of gearing in South Africa through a combination of a capital raise and asset sales.” It added, “Any capital raise is conditional on the implementation of the other project steps.”

PPC also signed a new working capital facility with its third South African lender, which it says “provides on-going liquidity until December 2021.”

Thailand: Siam Cement Group (SCG) will participate in a pilot run a of prototype payments system developed by Siam Commercial Bank (SCB) that integrates central bank digital currency (CBDC) into the group’s procurement and financial management systems. CoinDesk News has reported that the Bank of Thailand will launch the project in July 2020 and conclude it by January 2021. The bank said, “The project marks an important step in broadening CBDC’s scope and adoption to wider audiences, starting with large corporates.”

Mexico: Cemex has announced the amendment of its facilities agreement with several financial institutions to alter its consolidated leverage and coverage covenants. Under the new terms, the leverage covenant will increase to 6.75x for June 2020 and to 7.00x for September 2020 through to March 2021 and decrease thereafter.

Cemex chief financial officer (CFO) Maher Al-Haffar said, “We are very pleased with the completion of this process and with the support of our lenders. We are proud of our track record in working together with our bank group in both good and challenging time.”

Cemex said that as part of the amendment it has agreed to ‘temporarily limit certain flexibilities related to capital expenditure.’

Vietnam: Vietnam Cement Association (VCA) chair Nguyễn Quang Cung has announced the suspension of all cement plant projects scheduled to begin in 2020. Cung said that oversupply and a lack of financial liquidity have made it unfeasible for cement producers to finish cement plant projects, according to Vietnam News Brief Service. The average cost of an integrated cement plant in Vietnam is US$194m.

Two projects - the 2.5Mt/yr Tan Thanh cement plant and 2.3Mt/yr Long Son cement plant - will be completed in 2020, bringing the domestic integrated production capacity of Vietnam to 106Mt/yr across 86 plants.