Displaying items by tag: Shares

Canada: Quebec's Ministry of Economy and Innovation has confirmed that it has received a request from the shareholders of McInnis Cement to swap the debt the province holds in the venture for equity. A request has been made to the ministry and to Investissement Québec, the provincial government's investment arm, to convert almost US$200m of debt into shares in the cement producer, according to the Globe and Mail newspaper. The newspaper speculates that an arrangement of this kind could be part of a potential deal with creditors to reduce the company’s liabilities and enable it to continue to operate.

McInnis Cement’s plant at Port-Daniel–Gascons was inaugurated in mid-2017. Construction at the site started in mid-2014. However, cost overruns saw the government-backed project delayed and then taken over by an investor, the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ), a pension and insurance fund manager. The CDPQ was reportedly considering options including selling the plant or securing more investment in early 2018. Three bids were made for the cement producer but were rejected as being too low, according to reporting by the Globe and Mail. Interested parties in the company included Germany’s HeidelbergCement.

Greece: Titan Group has submitted a share exchange offer to help list its shares at exchanges in Brussels and Paris. Following the completion of the process, Belgium-based Titan Cement International will become Titan's ultimate parent company managed from Cyprus, according to Reuters. The group intends to list its shares at Euronext Brussels with secondary listings on the Athens Exchange and Euronext Paris. Titan says it wants to broaden its funding sources by improving access to international finance.

India: Emami Cement has started the process to file an initial public offering (IPO) for US$135m. It plans to issue equity shares worth US$37.5m and offer another US$37.5bn to existing shareholders, according to the Business Standard newspaper. Proceeds from offering will be used for debt repayment and general corporate purposes. The cement producer has a production capacity of 5.6Mt/yr from three plants in eastern India. It is also planning to open a new 3.7Mt/yr plant in April 2019.

Azerbaijan: LafargeHolcim has increased its stake in Holcim Azerbaijan to 76% from 66%. The move followed the decision by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to sell its 10% equity stake in the cement producer, according to ABZ News. Remaining shares in company are held by individual shareholders.

Bosnia & Herzegovina: Austria’s Asamer Baustoff plans to force a buyout of Fabrika Cementa Lukavac to acquire the remaining 0.46% share of the cement producer it does not already own. The building materials company intends to use its right to transfer voting shares from minority shareholders to itself, according to SeeNews. The move follows a previous move to increase its share in the cement producer in June 2018.

Kenya: The Nairobi Securities Exchange has suspended trading of ARM Cement following the company going into administration. The suspension took effect from 20 August 2018 and will last for seven days, according to Reuters. On 18 August 2018 PricewaterhouseCoopers said that the cement producer had been placed into administration following the resignation of its chief executive officer (CEO) Pradeep Paunrana. However, Paunrana intends to remain on the board of the company. PricewaterhouseCoopers has appointed Muniu Thoiti and George Weru as joint administrators.

In June 2017 ARM Cement reported that its net loss more than doubled to US$55m in 2017 due to poor demand in Kenya and Tanzania. UK-government investor CDC Group, which holds a 41% stake in the company, then forced the replacement of board members Ketso Gordhan and Pepe Meijer with Sofia Bianchi and Rohit Anand.

Zambia: ZCCM-Investment Holding, an investment company owned by the Zambian government, says that it will be the junior partner in a cement plant that it is planning to build in a joint venture with China Machinery Construction Group Limited (SinoConst). ZCCM will hold 35% of the joint venture, Central African Cement, and SinoConst will hold the remaining 65%. The US$680m project was announced in early 2018.

ZCCM also announced that its subsidiary, the Ndola Lime Company, was continuing to be in ‘distress.’ It said that its board was considering its options. The lime producer has reportedly suffered from liquidity problems and low production due to old equipment.

India: Emami Group is considering an initial public offering (IPO) for its cement subsidiary, Emami Cement. The IPO is intended to generate funds for expansion, according to sources quoted by the Hindu newspaper. The company has appointed a consultant to explore public issue prospects and preliminary discussions have started with merchant bankers. The cement producer has invested over US$575m to double its production capacity to 8Mt/yr from 4.4Mt/yr in the current financial year with plants in Chhattisgarh, West Bengal, Bihar and Odisha.

Nigeria: Lafarge Africa is considering raising up to US$248m in a share sale. The sale will take place in the fourth quarter of 2018 said chief financial officer Bruno Bayet whilst reporting the company’s half-year results, according to Bloomberg. Its sales rose by 5% year-on-year to US$448m in the first half of 2018 from US$427m in the same period in 2017. However, its earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) fell by 25% to US$76.4m from US$102m. The subsidiary of Switzerland’s LafargeHolcim blamed its falling earnings on poor performance in South Africa.

China: China National Building Material (CNBM) has agreed to buy a further 18.7% stake in Southwest Cement for US$295m from Zhonshai Trust. The building materials producer already owns a 70% majority stake in its subsidiary. The remaining stake in Southwest Cement is owned by Shanghai Zhentong (6.3%) and Beijing Huachen (5%).