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RHI Magnesita has taken the step this week of raising its prices globally by 5% for its products for its industrial and steel divisions. It has applied the increase to both its basic (magnesia and dolomite based) and non-basic products, varying in a range of 3% to 20%. It has blamed this on a global scarcity of raw materials caused mostly by Chinese environmental regulations on mining and processing. It goes on to attribute the issue to increased export taxes, more restrictive allocation of explosives and the nationalisation or controlled consolidation of mining operations in China. All of this has, “...structurally altered the production, pricing and dynamics for industrial minerals.”

Graph 1: Revenue in 2018 from industrial divisions at selected refractory producers. Source: Company reports.

Other major refractory producers, including Imerys and Vesuvius, reported similar mounting raw material costs in 2018. They also implemented price changes to maintain income and/or sales growth. As can partly be seen in Graph 1 some of the major refractory producers reported mixed fortunes in 2018 for their divisions that produce products for the cement industry.

RHI Magnesita noted that 2018 was a year of steady refractory market growth and relative stability for cement and lime from a global market perspective, with some significant variances on a regional basis. Imery’s Energy Solutions & Specialties division suffered due to flat markets. However, its High Resistance Materials division (not shown in Graph 1) benefited from the ongoing integration of Kerneos into the group. The group restructured its businesses at the end of 2018 creating a High Temperature Materials & Solution segment that brings together its various refractory concerns. Vesuvius' Steel Advanced Refractories division, which include monolithic products, reported particular growth in the Americas in 2018. Although it noted some market share loss in North Asia and in certain European countries, the latter due in price increases.

Refractories aren’t the only material or commodity used by the cement industry that has been distorted by Chinese domestic policy. Regulations on imports of waste streams including plastics started in 2017 leading to European and US suppliers struggling to find alternate markets. One implications of this appears to have been waste firms focusing on separating plastic into high and low calorific fractions to fight the downward price trends of a market glut. The outcomes are different but the sheer size and variety of China’s economy is increasingly affecting the cement industry in new and different ways.

RHI Magnesita’s travails in China and the debacle of waste imports bring to mind the quote by the 19th century Austrian diplomat Klemens von Metternic, ‘When Paris sneezes, Europe catches a cold.’ Metternic was referring to Napoleonic-era France and its aftermath. The modern version may have been used to reference the US but maybe it should be instead, ‘When China sneezes, the world catches a cold.’ Gesundheit.

Saudi Arabia: Mohammed Al-Subaie has been appointed as the chairman of Eastern Province Cement. He succeeds Abdulmohsen Al-Ruwaished, who has resigned. Ibrahim Al Ruwais has also been appointed as the company’s vice-chairman.

UK: Austria’s Untha has appointed Gary Moore as its Director of Global Business Development. Moore is currently the Sales Director of Untha UK, a position he will retain. His new global position will see him focus on improving the growth of Untha America.

India: Cement production grew by 10% year-on-year to 91.5Mt in the first quarter of 2019 from 81.9Mt in the same period in 2018. Data from the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) at the Ministry of Commerce & Industry shows that production sped up in March 2019.

India: Ambuja Cement’s net sales grew by 3% year-on-year to US$410m in the first three months of 2019 from US$398m in the same period in 2018. Its cement sales volumes rose by 2% to 6.37Mt from 6.22Mt. Its operating earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) fell by 9% to US$66.7m from its net profit after tax increased by 57% to US$61.4m. The cement producer said that its focus on alternative fuels had partly mitigated a ‘significant’ rise in power and fuels costs.

Indonesia: Indocement’s revenue grew by 8.5% year-on-year to US$262m in the first three months of 2019 from US$242m in the same period in 2018. Its net income rose by 50% to US$27.9m from US$18.6m.

Philippines: Ramon Lopez, the head of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), says that there is no need to impose a price cap on cement yet. However, he said that the government might intervene if the price of cement reached around US$4.6/bag, according to the Philippine Star newspaper. The DTI applied a US$4/t tariff on imported cement in mid-January 2019 for a period of 200 days in response to a surge in imports.

Peru: Cementos Pacasmayo’s sales revenue dropped slightly to US$94.6m in the first three months of 2019. Its consolidated earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) also fell a little to US$28.3m. However, its sales volumes of cement, concrete and precast rose by 5.4% to 593Mt from 563Mt. It blamed the declines in revenue and earnings on a slow down in public investment connected to a change in regional governments.

The cement producer also said that it has started selling cement in Iquitos. The capital of the country’s Amazonian Loreto region has been hard to reach due to its lack of road links. Cementos Pacasmayo said that it has been ‘aggressively’ taking advantage of a new tax law that supports its Rioja plant giving it a competitive advantage.

UK/Ireland: Breedon Group says that it has made ‘good progress’ across the business in the first quarter of 2019. Its revenue grew by 10% year-on-year to around Euro276m on a like-for-like basis. It attributed this to milder weather than in the same period in 2018. It said that it expects construction output in the UK to rise by 3% and at a higher rate in the Republic of Ireland.

US: National Cement is tendering for a new 5000t/day production line at its Ragland plant in Alabama. The subsidiary of France’s Vicat has reportedly had a permit for the upgrade since 2006. The plant operates one dry process kiln with a production capacity of 1.9Mt/yr.