FCC to provide loan to Cementos Portland by year-end, Spain

Spanish builder FCC is expected to extend a EUR100m (US$127.3m) loan to its cement subsidiary Cementos Portland by end-December, according to reports in local paper Expansion.

The credit is in line with the terms of the EUR1.274bn debt refinancing deal signed between Cementos Portland and its creditor banks in July.

FCC decided to grant the loan after Cementos Portland said it would suspend the envisaged EUR100m capital hike, required by the debt refunding agreement. However, at the presentation of the results for the first nine months of 2012, Cementos Portland announced it was still planning to launch the capital rise, but during the first half of 2013.

Cementos Portland reported a loss of EUR83m in the first nine months of 2012, versus a loss of EUR7.2m  a year earlier, attributed to provisions and adjustments which had to be made given declining domestic cement consumption. Revenue was down by 13.8 per cent on the year to EUR505m.

Exane BNP has cut its price target on Cementos Portland to EUR2.70 apiece.