Displaying items by tag: Sales

Colombia: Cementos Argos has announced that its second quarter net profit for 2018 slid by 59.7% to US$10m, due to a slowdown in the construction sector. Its operating revenue rose by 1.4% to US$741.6m during the same period.

“A recovery in demand is expected during the second half of the year given the increase in consumer confidence and positive signs for the residential sector, especially in social housing," said Cementos Argos in a statement.

Puerto Rico: Total cement sales in Puerto Rico expanded by 30% in July 2018, compared to July 2017, representing the seventh consecutive monthly increase. Sales of cement rose to 50,739t. Cement production rose by 19% over the same period.

Vietnam: The Vietnam Cement Industry Corporation (Vicem) exported the majority of its cement sales in the first half of 2018. The government-owned cement producer’s sales rose by 10.1% to 14.2Mt, according to the Viet Nam News newspaper. However, 11.7Mt of this figure was exported. The company’s cement and clinker production rose by 8.5% to 10.2Mt and 6.4% to 11.6Mt respectively.

Brazil: Paulo Camillo Penna, the president of the National Union of Cement Industry (SNIC), has blamed a fall in national cement sales on a truck drivers strike. Despite forecasting growth a strike in May 2018 caused sales to halt for 10 days. Cement sales fell by 1.5% year-on-year to 25.4Mt in the first half of 2018 from 25.8Mt in the same period of 2017.

SNIC originally expected the local cement industry to grow its sales by 1 – 2% in 2018. However, the poor first half of the year and a slowdown in the country’s economic growth has led SNIC to revise its forecast downwards.

Syria: Declassified notes from the French secret service reported upon by the Libération newspaper have revealed that the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group made at least US$11.5m in 2014 from cement it plundered from Lafarge Syria’s Jalabiya cement plant.

In December 2014 the Directorate of Military Intelligence (DRM) reported that ISIS had taken control of an estimated US$25m worth of cement at the site. Subsequently in late December 2014 the DRM monitored a meeting between Turkish businessmen and IS representatives from the cement plant that took place at the Turkish-Syrian border. 65,000t of cement from the plant had already been sold for US$6.5m and another 50,000t was contracted to be sold for US$5m.

Peru: Domestic cement sales climbed by 8.25% in Peru in May 2018. They had grown by 8.17% in April 2018, according to figures released by the National Institute of Statistics.

Czech Republic: Lafarge Cement’s sales in Czechia increased by almost 7% to Euro38.2m in 2017 but its profit dropped by 25% to Euro5.9m, according to spokeswoman Milena Hucanova.

Czech construction registered only moderate growth in 2017, which was reflected in the company's sales. Operating profit was comparable with the level from 2016.
"The company's net profit was mainly as a consequence of changes in the volume and appraisal of inventories, higher consumption of carbon credits and the firming up of the Koruna / Euro (exchange) rate after the Czech National Bank’s interventions," said CFO Jan Mencl.

Investments by the company in 2018 are planned to amount to Euro3.8m. Hucanova said that half of this had already been spent on the conversion of an electrostatic precipitator to a baghouse at the company’s Čížkovice plant.

Bolivia: Fábrica Nacional de Cemento (Fancesa) has increased its monthly sales target following local strikes in Chuquisaca. The company estimates that it lost US$6.95m in sales during the unrest, according to the Correo del Sur newspaper. It doesn’t intend to cut the cost of cement in Santa Cruz but it will give away a limited amount of free cement bags. Fancesa also plans to start selling bulk cement through concrete firms in the city.

Cameroon: Cement exports from Cameroon came to 57,459t in 2017, a 191% rise year-on-year compared to 19,700t in 2016, according to figures released by the Ministry of Economy, Planning and Spatial Planning (MINEPAT). Most of these exports to the countries of the Economic and Monetary Community of Central Africa (CEMAC).

Imports pale in comparison to exports at just 1282t in 2017, mainly coming from China and Turkey. They were, however, up on the 900t imported in 2017.

This increase in exports is explained by the increase in local cement production. Cameroon now has a cement production capacity of 3.7Mt/yr.

Vietnam: State-owned Vietnam Cement Industry Corporation (Vicem), the country’s leading cement producer, sold 9.2Mt of cement and clinker in the first four months of 2018, a 6.7% year-on-year rise from the same period in 2017. The corporation’s clinker and cement output also increased by 5% and 1.5% to 6.49Mt and 7.24Mt, respectively. Vicem aims to produce 1.8Mt of clinker and 2.5Mt of cement in May 2018. Its cement and clinker sales are expected to reach 2.7Mt in May 2018.

Vicem sold about 26.6Mt of cement and clinker in 2017, a rise of 3% year-on-year. 23.6Mt was sold locally, a 4% rise, and 3Mt was exported, a fall of 3%.