Posts By Date - Green Markets

OCP 1Q results off on lower prices, higher volumes

Morocco’s OCP SA reported a 27 percent drop in first-quarter EBITDA, to MAD 2.89 billion ($294 million) on revenues of MAD 10.34 billion ($1.06 billion), down from the year-ago MAD 3.95 billion ($411 million) and MAD 10.91 billion ($1.1 billion), respectively. The first-quarter EBITDA margin contracted eight percentage points year-on-year to 28 percent. Adjusted operating cash flows fell 71 percent to MAD 622 million ($63 million) in the quarter under review, sharply down from MAD 2.17 billion ($226 million) in the prior-year period.

“OCP continues to report margins that are significantly ahead of the industry average thanks to our key competitive advantages, mainly cost leadership and commercial and operating flexibility. The company’s unique access to low cost and high quality phosphate rock, our geographically diversified customer base and our industrial and commercial strategy combine to provide OCP with greater resilience to challenging market conditions,” said Mostafa Terrab, OCP’s chairman and CEO.

First quarter revenues were 5 percent down year-on-year, as weaker prices across all product classes more than offset higher volumes across all three segments – rock, acid and fertilizers, OCP said.

Looking ahead to the rest of the year, OCP concurs with industry analysts’ views that 2016 will be “a year of progressive improvement”. “We continue to expect second half results to outpace the first half, as demand increases within a more stable pricing environment, said Terrab.

PCI files antidumping complaint

May 26, 2016Breaking Industry NewsSteve Seay

PCI Nitrogen LLC, Pasadena, Texas, said May 26 that it has filed antidumping and countervailing duty petitions covering imports of ammonium sulfate from China with the International Trade Commission (ITC) and the Department of Commerce. PCI produces ammonium sulfate at its facility in Pasadena, Texas.

The petitions allege that Chinese producers of ammonium sulfate are dumping product in the United States at margins ranging from 273.33 to 474.94 percent. The petitions also allege that the Chinese national, provincial, and local governments are providing a host of countervailable subsidies including preferential loans, grants, income tax breaks, import duty and VAT exemptions, preferential freight rates, and inputs for below-market prices including natural gas, coal, electricity, and ammonia.

The petitions indicate that imports from China have increased by 682 percent from 2013 to 2015, and Chinese producers’ share of the U.S. market has increased significantly at the expense of U.S. producers. The petitions also say that Chinese imports are underselling U.S. producer prices by significant margins, and that this underselling has resulted in lower revenues and in material injury to the domestic industry. It also alleges that significant new capacity additions in China and other factors also indicate a threat of future injury to the domestic industry.

Under the antidumping and countervailing duty statutes, the ITC may make a preliminary injury determination in early July 2016, according to PCI, which said the DOC is expected to issue preliminary determinations in the countervailing duty investigations in August 2016 (October if extended) and in the antidumping duty investigations in November 2016 (January 2017 if extended). PCI expects all of the investigations will be completed within 13 to 14 months.