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India Cements slips into the red 27 May 2014
India: India Cements has incurred a net loss of US$5.19m for the quarter that ended in March 2014, driven by capacity overhang and weak demand. The company had earned a net profit of US$6.86m in the same period of 2013.
Net sales fell to US$183m from US$202m during the same period of 2013, while expenses dipped marginally to US$183m."Oversupply pressure continues, coupled with poor demand in south India," said India Cement's managing director N Srinivasan. Cement demand in south India was flat during the period. Consequently the company ran its southern cement plants at 70% of their rated capacity. Its Rajasthan plant produced cement at 98% of its rated capacity.
The company has been under a corporate debt-restructuring (CDR) scheme since January 2003, which ended in March 2014 with a US$9.69m charge. India Cements also incurred a US$7.97m loss due to foreign exchange fluctuations.
"With a new government in place we expect a turnaround in demand in the second half of this fiscal year," Srinivasan said.
Additional management adjustments at Cemex
Written by Global Cement staff
23 May 2014
Mexico: Further management changes have been implemented at Cemex, including the inclusion of six executive vice presidents, instead of five. The six vice presidents will report directly to the director general, Fernando Gonzalez, with the position of executive vice president of finance to be filled by Jose Antonio Gonzalez.
Juan Pablo San Agustín will continue as executive vice president of strategic planning and business development, while Maher Al-Haffar has been appointed as executive vice president of investor relations, corporate communications and public affairs. Luis Hernandez will continue as executive vice president of organisation and human resources, as well as security and administrative services, while he will also be responsible for processes, IT, innovation, global service organisation (GSO), the securities funding corporation (VMO) and the Neoris project. Ramiro Villarreal will remain head of legal affairs, taking up the position of executive vice president of legal, while he will continue as secretary of the board of directors. Mauricio Doehner has been appointed as executive vice president of corporate affairs and business risk management.
No changes have been made at the regional director level. Cemex executives have also expressed a desire to recover investment grade at the firm, lost during the crisis in 2009.
Rwanda: South Africa's PPC has said that it will begin the commissioning of its 0.60Mt/yr cement plant in Rwanda by the end of 2014, while construction of new plants in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DCCR), Zimbabwe and Ethiopia continues.
Jidong Cement plans to buy into Jilin Yatai 23 May 2014
China: Tangshan Jidong Cement plans to acquire about 108.48 million additional shares in Jilin Yatai Group for US$60.3m, at US$0.56/share. After that, Jidong Cement will hold less than a 5% stake in Jilin Yatai. Jidong Cement said that the capital source of the external investment was a self-owned one and that the deal would not affect its 2014 operations.
South Africa: PPC has announced that when the next round of PPC salary adjustments takes effect in October 2014, company CEO Ketso Gordhan would earn only 40 times more than his lowest-paid worker.
When Gordhan took over as CEO in January 2013 he was earning 120 times more than his lowest-paid worker. However, the company's drive to reduce the earnings differential had reduced this to a multiple of 48. This followed Gordhan's US$96,370 pay cut in October 2013, while the remuneration of his top 60 managers was frozen so that the wages of the cement maker's 1200 lowest-paid workers could be raised.
Gordhan said that he would not take a pay increase in October 2014 and PPC's other executives would be awarded increases of about 4.5 - 5%, less than the usual 6.5%. This would allow the minimum total pay package at PPC to be hiked to nearly US$1060. According to Gordhan, the 40-times multiple was seen by many as 'a justifiable spread.'
The company's new black economic empowerment (BEE) deal, which gives employees 12% share ownership in the company, could generate as much as US$193m for PPC's employees over five years if share price targets of US$5.78/share are reached.
The company's new BEE deal is a restructure of its 2008 deal, which was designed around broad-based trusts but was complicated and costly. The new BEE deal involves the issue of ordinary shares to the PPC Phakamani Trust and the issue of a new class of perpetual preference shares, to be used to raise capital to fund the unwinding.