HeidelbergCement has announced a 4.3 per cent YoY increase in group revenue to EUR18.851bn in its preliminary results for 2019. On a like-for-like (LfL) basis, the rise moderated to 2.1 per cent YoY. The result from current operations advanced 8.8 per cent YoY to EUR2.186bn, or 4.5 per cent growth LfL.
However, the company’s cement and clinker sales volumes fell 3.1 per cent in 2019 to 125.9Mt. Excluding consolidation effects, sales volumes were 1.6 per cent below the previous year. Aggregates sales were slightly down on last year at 308.3Mt, while ready-mixed concrete volumes climbed 3.4 per cent YoY to 50.7Mm3 in 2019.
The development of sales volumes mainly resulted from the company’s strategy of focussing more on necessary price increases than on sales volumes, which led to a decline in volumes in the 4Q19. Sales volumes for the full-year 2019 were therefore slightly below expectations, according to a press release.
Elsewhere, HeidelbergCement notes that its net debt fell to EUR7.1bn before the application of IFRS16 by the end of 2019 and thereby declined below its already downward-adjusted forecast of EUR7.4bn made in November 2019.
