Global Cement News

New Zealand: Holcim New Zealand has reported an after-tax surplus of US$6.77m in 2011 according to its annual report. Total revenue for the year fell by 1.55% to US$214 from US$217m in 2010. Sales of cement fell slightly in 2011 and have been in decline since mid-2008. The national use of cement is a quarter lower than the last peak in 2007.

Notably a proposed new cement plant at Weston, near Oamaru, was on hold because of global economic uncertainty and would not be considered again before late in 2012, the annual report said. However, Holcim's partnerships with large construction companies brought several new projects in 2011, including the Fisher & Paykel Healthcare plant in Auckland and the Auckland District Health Board's six-level car park. Customers south of Christchurch were serviced from Dunedin and bagged cement for Christchurch came from Nelson and Dunedin while bulk cement for Holcim's Sockburn silos was railed from Westport and trucked from Dunedin.

Portugal: Cimpor says a takeover offer from Brazil's Camargo Corrêa is too low and lacks detail on its plans for Cimpor's future. The leading Portuguese cement-maker would not recommend to shareholders whether they should sell or keep their stakes.

Camargo, Brazil's second-largest construction group, launched a Euro5.5/share takeover bid for the 67.1% of Cimpor it does not own at the end of March 2012. Analysts had expected the bid to succeed after two key shareholders said they were prepared to sell. Yet the board's opinion, given in a statement issued late on 13 April 2012, could complicate the process or require sweetening of the bid. Camargo is already the largest single Cimpor shareholder and the outstanding shares it does not own in Cimpor are valued at around Euro2.4bn.

Cimpor's statement said the offer does not include a premium for taking control of the company and lacks detail on what would happen to Cimpor's asset portfolio, debt profile and dividend policy. "For the above reasons, the board is not in a position to recommend to shareholders to tender their shares, as the price is low and significantly undervalues Cimpor, and, in the absence of adequate information on the future of Cimpor post-offer, neither may the board recommend to shareholders to maintain their investment," it said.

Portuguese conglomerate Semapa earlier proposed that some Cimpor shareholders should form a joint holding company to try to keep the company in Portuguese hands. Its offer does not represent a counter-bid, but Semapa said it implies a price of Euro5.75/share.

Camargo has said the price it offered is fair, expecting most Cimpor shareholders to use this 'good opportunity', but would not say if it would consider sweetening the offer. It also said in the statement that the price implied in Semapa's complex proposal could not be compared to Camargo's direct bid. It said that Semapa's arrangement, if it were to go ahead, would have to trigger a compulsory competing bid by those who join the Semapa-proposed holding company.

Vietnam: Vietnam's cement sales came to 9.57Mt in the first quarter of 2012, according to the Ministry of Construction. This fulfilled 17.4% of the whole-year plan due to the implementation of several projects in March 2012. Production was 9.98Mt, meeting 18.1% of the full-year target. Production in March 2012 was 4.85Mt, representing nearly half of the quarter's total.

Vietnam spent US$90.5m on imports in the first quarter of 2012, making up 20.7% of the whole-year plan, including US$30.9m in March 2012. The country's exports were US$43.3m, fulfilling 19.2% of the full-year target, including US$10.4m in March 2012.

National consumption is forecast to reach between 55Mt and 56.5Mt in 2012, rising by 11% and 12% from 2011 respectively. Yet the country's cement output is forecast to rise to 73Mt in 2012 due to the additional operation of eight new cement plants with combined production capacity of 6.9Mt. In 2011 Vietnam produced and sold 49.3Mt. The country also imported 1.15Mt and exported 5.5Mt of cement and clinker during the period, the ministry noted.

South Africa: An order by South African competition authorities to delay cement industry statistics by three months will negatively affect perceptions of economic activity in the country, according to industry newcomer Sephaku Cement.

The CEO of Sephaku Pieter Fourie said that the directive by the South African Competition Commission to the Cement and Concrete Institute that it delay the publication of its quarterly national cement sales figures by three months made 'no sense'. The institute represents the four major cement producers in South Africa: Pretoria Portland Cement, AfriSam, Lafarge and NPC-Cimpor.

Sephaku, a Nigerian-backed newcomer, is building an integrated cement production facility in the Limpopo province, where it intends to produce cement from the fourth quarter of 2013. It says that cement sales form a large component of construction activity in South Africa and are a leading economic indicator. Sephaku believe that the change in reporting will affect related economic predictions.

Stephan Olivier, CEO of AfriSam, commented that the change in industry reporting was a bid to make it difficult to use the data for anti-competitive behaviour. Simon Roberts, chief economist and manager of the commission's policy and research division, said that companies had previously used the data provided by the institute to 'monitor' their cartel agreement.

Projects by Nigerian-backed Sephaku and a new Chinese-backed empowerment entity, Conticem, will boost South Africa's capacity by nearly 5Mt/yr. Both Sephaku and AfriSam anticipate a better industry outlook in 2012 but uncertainty remains over the government's ability to accelerate its infrastructure plans.

Camargo Corrêa's ongoing bid for Cimpor must be creating nightmares for Brazil's anti-cartel authorities.

If the takeover goes through, Camargo Corrêa's Brazilian market share will rise from 24% to 37% according to data from the Global Cement Directory 2012. Together with industrial conglomerate Grupo Votorantim, who already own 21% of Cimpor, this share would amount to 72% of the country's total cement capacity.

As covered in this week's Global Cement Weekly #44 Jose Barros Franco, chief executive of Intercement a subsidiary of Camargo Corrêa, has explicitly denied that Camargo had a pre-agreement with Votorantim to split up Cimpor assets. However, he did not rule out a deal in the future to jointly manage the company. This implies that companies representing nearly three-quarters of the Brazilian cement market might be working together to at least some degree!

In October 2011 Camargo Corrêa denied that it was in talks to buyout Cimpor. According to one source at that time, Camargo Corrêa planned to take over Cimpor's operations in Brazil while Votorantim was considering taking assets outside of Brazil. Currently analysts expect the same thing to happen now if the takeover goes through, especially given any possible anti-competitive attention in Brazil.

With operations in four continents Portugal's Cimpor holds 77% of its global capacity outside of Brazil. If the takeover does actually happen, then the key question is this: how much of Cimpor's international operation does Votorantim want in return for helping its competitor Camargo Corrêa to grow back at home in Brazil?