Displaying items by tag: Qalaa Holdings

Egypt: Qalaa Holdings recorded first-quarter 2022 sales of US$991m, more than double its figure for the first quarter of 2021. Its loss during the quarter was US$30.9m, up by 22% year-on-year from US$25.4m. Its subsidiary ASEC Holding Group increased its sales by 46% year-on-year to US$53m. The cement company attributed the growth to the 'strong performance' of its integrated cement plant in Sudan.

Daily News Egypt has reported that Qalaa Holdings is currently prioritising the on-going restructuring of its debts.

Algeria: Egypt’s Qalaa Holdings has announced that its subsidiary ASEC Cement is looking to exit from Algeria-based Zahana Cement Factory. ASEC holds around a 35% stake in the Algerian facility and has so far invested US$62m in the plant, taking its capacity to 0.75Mt/yr. A new 1.6Mt/yr production line is currently being constructed at the plant, with commissioning expected in early 2020.

Egypt: Qalaa Holdings' revenue grew by 19% year-on-year to US$262m in the third quarter of 2015. In the first nine months of 2015, its revenue rose by 31% to US$777m. The growth was attributed to ASEC Cement and energy distribution business TAQA Arabia. ASEC Holding saw its top line grow by 30% to US$299m.

Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) for the third quarter of 2015 fell by 9% to US$27.4m. The decrease comes on the back of several factors; Qalaa's exit from Misr Cement Qena, which had been positively contributing to EBITDA; the third quarter of 2015 having two Eid Holidays (Eid El Fitr and Eid El Adha) leading to less working days; and Sudan's Al-Takamol facing temporary fuel shortages during the third quarter of 2015. These factors affected cement revenues and EBITDA. In the first nine months of 2015, Qalaa's EBITDA grew by 71% to US$99.5m.

Qalaa has continued to press forward with its strategy of divesting non-core investments, with several exits concluded during the first nine months of 2015 and more recently in the fourth quarter of 2015. In the second quarter of 2015, Qalaa concluded the sale of its 27.5% stake in Misr Cement Qena, while in the fourth quarter of 2015, the company further reduced its exposure to the cement industry with its business unit ASEC Cement divesting its stakes in subsidiaries ASEC Minya Cement and ASEC Ready Mix.

"We are pressing ahead with plans to divest assets that will allow us to deleverage and devote maximum attention to high-growth businesses in sectors that are vital to the development of our region such as refining, energy distribution and transportation and logistics," said Qalaa Holdings Chairman and Founder Ahmed Heikal. "We remain firmly committed to growing our investments in ERC, Egypt's largest in-progress private-sector megaproject due to begin production in 2017, and TAQA Arabia, which is pursuing exciting new opportunities in gas distribution, electricity generation and renewable energy. In parallel, we are also looking for opportunities to unlock shareholder value at subsidiaries, including ASCOM and Rift Valley Railways, which have strong growth outlooks."

"The sale of ASEC Cement's Egyptian assets alongside other transactions will fundamentally re-shape Qalaa's financials, giving more weight on both our income statement and balance sheet to ongoing operations at our energy and mining units and setting the stage for the transformative impact of ERC," said Qalaa Holdings Co-Founder and Managing Director Hisham El-Khazindar. "The near-full impact of the substantial deleveraging that accompanies these transactions will be felt in our fourth quarter 2015 and first quarter 2016 financials."

The company reported a net loss after tax and minority interest of US$16m in the third quarter of 2015, a two-fold increase compared to the net loss of US$7.59m in the same period of 2014. On a nine month basis, however, bottom-line losses narrowed by 31% to US$41.2m compared to US$60m in the same period of 2014

Egypt: ASEC Cement, a subsidiary of Egypt's Qalaa Holdings, has announced plans to sell its stakes in ASEC Minya and ASEC Ready Mix to Misr Qena Cement for US$125m. The respective stakes are 46.5% and 55%. The deal is expected close on or before 20 November 2015.

Egypt: Qalaa Holdings' revenue in the quarter that ended on 30 June 2015 grew by 33.7% year-on-year to US$267m.

In the first six months of the year, revenue rose by 37.8% to EGP US$515m. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) rise by 169% year-on-year to US$72.2m in the first half of 2015. Qalaa's net loss after tax and minority interest improved by 55% to US$10.8m in the second quarter of 2015. In the first half of 2015, its net loss after tax improved by 53% to US$25.1m. This improvement comes despite charges of US$13.1m in the first half of 2015 related to discontinued operations.

Revenue growth was driven by strong performance at TAQA Arabia's fuel marketing arm, which reported 72% top-line growth in the second quarter of 2015 and 73%in the first half of 2015. In the cement division, ASEC Cement's Sudan subsidiary Al-Takamol made a strong contribution to Qalaa's top-line growth. Its revenue grew by 96% in the second quarter of 2015 and by 121% in the first half of 2015. Combined, the energy and cement divisions contributed some 70% of total revenue in the second quarter of 2015.

The first six months of 2015 saw ASEC Holding's sale of its 27.5% stake in Misr Qena Cement, which resulted in a gain from sale of investment equivalent to US$8.56m booked in the second quarter of 2015. The exit from Misr Qena Cement is one of several developments taking place during 2015 that play into Qalaa's risk reduction strategy and its ongoing deleveraging programme. Qalaa's ongoing restructuring efforts continue to reflect positively on its financial performance, with significant improvements at the EBITDA level and a continued narrowing of its bottom-line losses, which improved by 53% year-on-year in the first half of 2015.

Qalaa management has reiterated its strategy for 2015, with its underlining factors being the mitigation of financial risk by significantly deleveraging at the holding and platform company levels, as well as limiting operational risk through the divestment of non-core and non-essential assets while focusing resources on core business and ensuring they have the funding needed to deliver on growth plans.

"Qalaa has repeatedly stressed that deleveraging is one of the company's key strategic goals for 2015 and onward," said Qalaa co-founder and managing director Hisham El-Khazindar. "We remain on track with our divestment programme, the proceeds from which will be utilised to reduce total consolidated debt from the current US$971m, excluding debt associated with Africa Railways and a greenfield megaproject, to around US$639m by the end of 2015."

Egypt/Sudan: According to Daily News Egypt, Qalaa Holding for Investment has signed an agreement with Financial Holding International (FHI) to sell FHI some of Qalaa's units. This is in line with Qalaa's aim to exit from some of its non-basic businesses and to reduce its consolidated debts of US$105m.

Qalaa will sell FHI its stakes in MENA Homes, Grandview and Dina Farms Land Companies, which will be separated from Dina for Agricultural Investments. In return, Qalaa will buy FHI's stakes in several affiliated companies, including cement producer ASEC Holding, as well as Taqa Arabia and Mashreq Petroleum in the energy sector. Qalaa will also buy FHI's stakes in Nile Logistics International in the Transport and logistics sector, Dina Farms Supermarkets in the retail sector and United Company for Foundries (UCF) in the metallurgical industry sector. The deal is expected to be finalised by December 2015, after the customary conditions and requirements are met.

Abdallah El-Ebiary, managing director of Qalaa's cement division, said that the cement sector is a main strategic area for Qalaa and that it has no intention of exiting it, nor the transport and energy sectors. He added that FHI plans to build a new pulveriser mill at the ASEC Cement plant in Minya, Egypt within the company's plan to convert to alternative energy due to the energy deficit and gas crisis. The cost will be US$30.2m and it will be built in the fourth quarter of 2015. "The company's strategy for the next period is to diversify to new and cheap energy sources instead of the traditional and unavailable sources. The investment cost is at US$30.2m, with US$1.31m for a pulveriser mill and US$11.8m for alternative fuel production," said El-Ebiary.

Qalaa also plans to increase the production capacity of its Takamol cement plant in Sudan from 430,000t/yr to 800,000t/yr in 2016. Qalaa aims to establish a new coal mine for the plant. The plant is 51% owned by ASEC Cement and 49% controlled by the Sudanese Social Security Investment Authority (SSIA), the entity that manages all pension funds in Sudan.

Algeria: Qalaa Holdings, an investment company in the Middle East and Africa, has reported that its revenue in the first quarter of 2015 grew by 42.5% year-on-year to US$256m. Growth was driven mainly by operational improvements at ASEC Cement's Sudan subsidiary Al-Takamol, which recorded 157% year-on-year revenue growth. The energy and cement segments contributed 71% to its consolidated revenues.

Qalaa Holdings reported that its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) stood at US$36.2m, an eight-fold increase on the same period of 2014. It had a net loss after tax and minority of US$14.7m in the first quarter of 2015, a 51.6% year-on-year improvement. Foreign exchange charges rose to US$6.95m, compared to a gain of US$1.71m in the first quarter of 2014. Qalaa Holdings' cement and construction unit ASEC Holding recorded US$10.2m in foreign exchange losses due to its stake in dollar-denominated ASEC Holding Convertible.

Qalaa Holdings' plans for the future include several cement divestments. Negotiations are progressing for the sale of ASEC Cement's operations in Algeria, with an Algerian Holding Company in the cement industry being the natural buyer for Zahana Cement as it already owns 65% of the company. The greenfield plant in Djelfa, Algeria is being bid for by two Algeria-based industrial groups.

Egypt/Ethipopia: ASEC Engineering and Management, a subsidiary of Egypt's Qalaa Holdings, has signed a one-year plant management agreement with Ethiopia's National Cement Share Company.

As per the deal, Asec will provide full technical assistance to National Cement Share Company for the operation and maintenance of the 1Mt/yr capacity cement plant. ASEC will also utilise its know-how and expertise to help National Cement Share Company to boost production volumes, cut production costs and improve product quality. Under the contract, ASEC will also introduce and implement systems for all aspects of production, quality, maintenance, warehousing and human resources, among other areas.

"This is a result of the continued efforts of ASEC Engineering and its ambitious plans to expand its business into Sub-Saharan Africa after its successful contract with Cimento Nacional Company in Mozambique," said ASEC Engineering CEO Khaled El Sebaie.