Wagners reports steep drop in profits for 2020

Wagners, the Australian construction materials business, reported a lower after-tax pro-forma profit of AUD3.92m (US$2.9m) for its 2020 annual results, down from the AUD13.7m in the prior year.

Company CEO, Cameron Coleman, said the cement pricing dispute with competitor Boral, now resolved, and the loss of major infrastructure projects negatively impacted the company over the past 12 months.
“The key message that I’m trying to communicate to investors is (the result was because of) reduced cement sales due to the dispute with Boral, as well as a lack of major infrastructure work, leading us to shut down our precast business.

“It was a tough year, but we’ve got Boral back to normal supply levels, and we’ve got contracts secured so we expect continued growth.” Mr Coleman said investors could expect business growth over the coming year. “We’ve got AUD40m of work in hand for our casting business through the CRR,” he said.

“The other key thing is our contract crushing services saw little revenue last year, but we already have the AUD30m contract at the Carmichael Mine. “We look forward to the increase in infrastructure activities with the government bringing forward shovel-ready projects to help us recover from COVID-19.”