All Posts from March 27, 2012

ICL reports record 4Q

Israel Chemicals Ltd. reported a sharp rise in net profits and in revenues for the fourth quarter of 2011. The company said that the fourth quarter was the best in the company’s history. ICL reported a 50 percent rise in net profits to $370 million versus $245 million in the same quarter in 2010. Revenues were up by 20 percent to $1.71 billion compared to $1.42 billion in the fourth quarter of the previous year. ICL also reported that it was currently in negotiations with Chinese customers on closing potash deals.

For the year, ICL reported a 48 percent rise in net profits to $1.511 billion versus $1.024 billion in 2010. Revenues were up by 24 percent to $7.067 billion compared to $5.692 billion in the previous year.

ICL Fertilizers, the company’s largest division, accounted for 54 percent of total ICL revenues in 2011. The division reported a 31 percent in revenues to $4.1 billion versus $3.1 billion in 2010. The operating profit was up by 45 percent to $1.403 billion versus $965 million in 2010. Potash revenues totaled $2.506 billion versus $2.140 billion in 2010. Fertilizers and phosphate rock sales totaled $1.705 billion versus $1.056 billion in 2010.

The company attributed the improved results to a sharp increase in fertilizer sales and the contribution of a number of acquisitions.

Agrium plant returns to production

Agrium Inc.’s Carseland, Alberta, nitrogen plant, which has been down for maintenance, returned to production March 23, 2012. The company said it is currently operating at 80 percent of capacity and lost some 56,000 mt of urea due to the five week outage.

In other news, Agrium confirms that there has been positive movement toward the start up of the MOPCO nitrogen complex in Egypt, which was idled late last year due to local unrest and complaints about environmental concerns regarding the expansion at the facility. However, to date, there is not an official start up date for the complex, which is 26 percent owned by Agrium.