Displaying items by tag: Dangote Cement

Nigeria: Dangote Cement recorded sales of US$1.9bn during the first nine months of 2023, up by 29% year-on-year from nine-month 2022 levels. The group’s sales volumes of cement and clinker both dropped. The Premium Times newspaper has reported that Dangote Cement’s costs rose by 33%, primarily due to increased spending on electricity and fuel. Nonetheless, its profit after tax grew by 30%, to US$351m.

Nigeria: Dangote Group has described online reports that it would halve the price of its 50kg bags of cement as ‘fake news.’ Anthony Chiejine, Spokesperson for Dangote Group, was responding to apparently unfounded reports that prices would tumble on 1 October 2023.

Earlier, Bahir Ahmad, a media aide to former Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, saying on X (formerly Twitter) “The Dangote Group has denied the trending reports that it has reduced the price of cement.”

The online rumour is thought to have gained traction after Dangote’s rival BUA Group chair Abdul Samad Rabiu disclosed that he had discussed a substantial potential price reduction with current President Bola Ahmed Tinubu earlier in September 2023.

The prospect of lower cement prices in Nigeria is often reported, but prices remain stubbornly high. On 28 September 2023, the regional monarch of Idjerhe Kingdom, King Udurhie I, called on the new national President Bola Ahmed Tinbu to reopen the mothballed Madewell Cement Factory in Idjerhe, and five others like it throughout Nigeria, in an effort to increase supply and introduce competition to a market dominated by two or three major players.

King Udurhie toured the Madewell facility with regional chiefs, stating “It is 15 years ago that this project was brought down by cabals in the cement industry. As a King of this land, I see pain and I believe that, with the coming in of President Tinubu, a man who is business-oriented, he knows the importance of the cement sector to the Nigerian economy. The cement industry is too large for one man or one company to deal in, no individual can do this.”

Nigeria: Dangote Cement plans to raise its alternative fuel (AF) substitution rate across its Nigerian operations to 25%. The Punch newspaper has reported that the producer consumed 34,800t of AF during the first half of 2023.

Obajana cement plant head of sustainability Eseosa Ighile said “We are working towards installing AF feeding systems in all our operation lines by 2024.”

Dangote Cement felt compelled to issue a statement clarifying its prices at the end of August 2023. In the release it stated what its ex-factory price was in Nigeria and added that transport costs and the location of a delivery could add additional expense. It made the declaration in response to alleged “misinformation” on social media channels that the company had been selling its cement more cheaply in the neighbouring country of Benin. A subsequent investigation by the This Day newspaper reported that Dangote Cement does not officially export cement to Benin and that the average price in the country was actually slightly higher than the end prices Dangote Cement provided. Competitor BUA Cement wasted no time though in saying at its annual general meeting that it would ‘crash the price of cement.’

All of this may sound familiar because a similar argument broke out in early 2021. At that time prices were rising following the outbreak of Covid-19, although other factors were at play. Then as now, Dangote Cement, the largest domestic producer, defended itself by publishing its prices and BUA Cement made another showy claim saying that it had no plans to raise the ex-factory price of its cement at the present time or in the future, “…barring any material, unforeseen circumstances.” The government also became involved with the Senate of Nigeria discussing the matter in relation to potential legislation at the time. Part of the problem here has been that Dangote Cement is the biggest producer and it has gradually started exporting cement from Nigeria in recent years and, regardless of any effects to the domestic market, it leaves it exposed to the kind of unsubstantiated scuttlebutt it has faced recently. Back in 2021 it briefly stopped exporting cement for a while before resuming it again in May 2021.

Graph 1: Half-year sales revenue from selected large cement producers in Nigeria. Source: Company reports.

Graph 1 shows how some of the large cement producers in Nigeria did in the first half of 2023. Dangote Cement is the market leader by a considerable margin and the figures here do not even include its sales elsewhere in Sub-Saharan Africa. Despite its market dominance its sales revenue has fallen so far in 2023 and the company blamed election uncertainty, a “cash crunch”, negative currency exchange issues and the weather. That said though it did manage to increase its earnings through initiatives such as using alternative fuels, making efficiencies at its plants and utilised compressed natural gas in its truck fleet.

BUA Cement and Lafarge Africa provided less descriptive context in their release. Both BUA Cement’s revenue and profit after tax rose year-on-year but Lafarge Africa’s profit after tax fell. This may have been due to a rise in fixed production costs such as staffing, by-products costs and electricity, although depreciation was also an issue.

For all of BUA Cement’s talk of “crashing the cement price” it is preparing to commission two new 3Mt/yr production lines at its Obu and Sokoto plants respectively in the first quarter of 2024. Given everything else that is going on in the Nigerian economy, such as inflation, and the large size of the country it seems unlikely to lower the price although it might slow down the rate by which the price continues to rise. In its 2022 annual report BUA Cement’s managing director Yusuf Haliru Binji said that the new production lines would enable it to potentially increase its exports. This is the logical next step for a local sector outgrowing its domestic bounds and this is exactly what Dangote Cement has done. Yet, as the recent price debacle has shown, the price of cement matters to Nigerians. If the price keeps going up all of the local producers may end up facing negative attention whether warranted or not.

Nigeria: Dangote Cement has publicly confirmed the price of cement from its plants. It made the announcement in response to allegations that it has been selling its products at “significantly” lower prices in neighbouring countries including Benin, according to the Daily Trust newspaper. It also detailed how much transportation costs and the location of a delivery could affect the end price. Arvind Pathak, the Group Managing Director of Dangote Cement, added that the company’s ex-factory price could be different from the end retail price.

Nigeria: Dangote Cement sold 13.4Mt of cement during the first half of 2023. Its sales volumes outside Nigeria were 5.4Mt, up by 12% year-on-year from 4.9Mt in the first half of 2022. The producer noted 'robust demand' in Ethiopia, the Republic of Congo, Senegal and Zambia. It reported revenues worth US$1.23bn in the first half of 2023, up by 17% from first-half 2022 levels. KOGI Reports News has reported that the producer's profit after tax rose by 3.8% in the half, to US$232m.

Chief executive officer Arvind Pathak said "Dangote Cement delivered positive results in the first half of the year. Our Nigeria operations achieved a 23% quarter-on-quarter recovery in sales during the second quarter of 2023, which was impacted by the general elections and the 'cash crunch.' However, the steep currency devaluation in mid-June slowed this volume recovery and increased already inflated operating costs." He added “We will continue to focus on our strategic growth priorities, hinged on our vision of transforming Africa and building a sustainable future. I am optimistic that our business remains resilient and well positioned to overcome unforeseen macroeconomic headwinds.”

Nigeria: Dangote Cement has completed the first tranche of its on-going share buyback programme. The Punch newspaper has reported that the producer launched the buyback earlier in July 2023. It bought back 0.7% of its shares for US$51.7m.

Ghana: Dangote Cement says that it has finished building a new grinding plant in Ghana. Tech Economy News has reported that the new facility has a capacity of 400,000t/yr.

Dangote Cement already operates the Tema cement terminal in Accra. Local press previously reported that Dangote Cement imported 1.5Mt of cement into Ghana in 2022.

Nigeria: Lafarge Africa has appointed Chinedu Richard as its acting Chief Financial Officer.

Richard has worked for Lafarge Africa for over 10 years in a variety of financial roles. Most recently he held the position of Head of Finance Planning & Analysis. Prior to working for Lafarge Africa he was a Financial Analyst for Dangote Cement. He has also worked for Oando.

Richard is a graduate of pharmacy from the University of Lagos and holds a masters degree in business administration (MBA) from Lagos Business School. He is also a member of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA).

Mining and materials company Afrimat said it was buying Lafarge South Africa this week. The assets it is acquiring include aggregate quarries, ready mix concrete (RMX) batching plants, one integrated cement plant, two cement grinding plants, cement terminals and fly-ash sources. The means of purchase is somewhat unusual, as Afrimat is paying around US$6m but it also appears to be taking responsibility for around US$50m of outstanding debt that Lafarge South Africa owes its parent company, Holcim. In a statement Afrimat’s chief executive officer (CEO) Andries van Heerden talked up the benefits for his company in terms of the boost to its aggregates and concrete businesses.

This is quite the change from 2012 when India-based Aditya Birla Group was reportedly looking into buying Lafarge South Africa. At this time the value for the business for a similar mix of assets, including 55 RMX plants and 20 quarries, was said to be to US$900m. Prior to this, Lafarge South Africa spent around US$170m in the late 2000s on increasing the production capacity at its integrated Lichtenburg plant and building its Randfontein grinding plant. Then in 2014, when the merger between Lafarge and Holcim was announced, Lafarge consolidated its Nigeria-based and South Africa-based operations as Lafarge Africa. It later decided to move the South African business to another Holcim subsidiary, Caricement, in 2019 to keep the business in Nigeria more profitable by reducing its debts. This transaction was valued at US$317m. At the time chair Mobolaji Balogun said that Lafarge South Africa’s operations had faced a challenging market in South Africa, with shrinking demand in an aggressively competitive sector. Afrimat is now buying Lafarge South Africa and its subsidiaries from Caricement.

Holcim isn’t alone in making an effort to sell up in South Africa. In April 2023 the Valor Econômico newspaper reported that Brazil-based InterCement was receiving offers for its remaining African-based assets in Mozambique and South Africa with a potential deal valued at around US$300m. InterCement runs Natal Portland Cement in South Africa, which operates one integrated plant and two grinding units. This follows the sale of its Egypt-based assets in January 2023 to an unnamed buyer.

PPC, the country’s largest cement producer, is staying put. However, it issued a mixed trading update this week ahead of the formal release of its annual results to 31 March 2023. Trading conditions in the interior of South Africa and Botswana were described as being ‘difficult,’ with cement sales volumes down by nearly 6% year-on-year and earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) down by 26%. Yet the group says it was able to grow its revenue. PPC’s CEO Roland van Wijnen added, “We therefore remain hopeful that the South African government will roll out its infrastructure development plans and protect the local cement market through the introduction of import tariffs to create a level playing field for domestic producers.” Dangote Cement subsidiary Sephaku Cement was more circumspect in its recent trading update but it too warned that, “deteriorating economic conditions and persistent challenges in the cement industry impacted Sephaku Cement’s financial performance to break-even levels.”

Much of the above makes for gloomy reading. As the local trade association Cement and Concrete South Africa (CCSA) has laid out to local media, the market faces the problem of having 20Mt/yr of production capacity, 12Mt/yr of demand and over 1Mt/yr of imports compounding the problem. Lobbying by local producers against imports has been a feature of the market since the early 2010s and this work continues through the efforts of the CCSA and others. However, the plea by PPC for government infrastructure spending suggests that the market faces more systemic problems. As a consequence some cement producers are trying to leave the market, while others are attempting to tough it out.