Eagle Materials: higher costs and lower volume

Eagle Materials:  higher costs and lower volume
29 July 2011


For its first quarter of the financial year to 31 March, Eagle Materials’ turnover, including its share of the Texas Lehigh cement joint venture, declined by 5.6% to US$141.2m. The pre-tax profit profit fell by 72.5% to US$4.0m, after charging net interest costs that were 13.3% lower at US$4.6m.   The net attributable dropped by 71.0% to US$3.1m and the net debt was 0.9% lower at US$347.8m to give a gearing level of 75.8%.

Turnover from cement was down by 3.9% to US$59.1m, as the wholly-owned operations reported an 11.5% reduction to US$37.7m, but the company’s share of the Texas Lehigh joint venture rose by 13.6% to US$21.4m. As a result the trading profit fell by 35.5% to US$8.83m.  Lower cement volume and higher maintenance costs were behind the drop in profitability. Consolidated cement deliveries were down by 4.0% to 0.61Mt (0.67Mst). Volumes in the wholly-owned operations declined by 7.1%, but rose by 10.3% in the Buda joint venture. The average cement price was 0.2% lower at US$89.56/t (US$81.25/st). 
Published under Cement News