Cement News tagged under: France

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Lafarge places seven-year EUR500m bond

03 July 2012, Published under Cement News

Lafarge placed today, under its Euro Medium-Term Note program, a EUR500m bond with a seven year maturity and fixed annual coupon of 5.875% to institutional investors.   While Lafarge had no immediate refinancing needs, the company said: “proceeds of this bond issuance will reinforce the already strong liquidity position of the Group.”   The settlement and issuance of the bond are expected to occur on 9 July 2012.

Lafarge to cut a further 97 jobs in France

27 June 2012, Published under Cement News

Lafarge expects to cut a further 97 jobs in its domestic market of France as part of a plant to merge its three French divisions into one, to be headquartered in the Paris region. Lafarge, which employs a total of 68,000 people including 5300 in France, said in February it would cut 460 jobs worldwide, including 90 in France as part of a its corporate restructuring announced in November 2011. Earlier this month the group unveiled plans to cut costs by EUR1.3bn and increase profits over...

Eurozone April construction output falls

21 June 2012, Published under Cement News

Construction output in the 17 nations that use the euro dropped 2.7 per cent in April compared to the month before, and five per cent from April 2011, the European Union's official statistics agency Eurostat said Tuesday. Eurostat also lowered its estimate for the growth of construction output in March, to 11.4 per cent from 12.4 per cent. The decline in construction during April was widespread across the currency area, with building work down six per cent in Germany, 2.3 per cent in Spain...

Fitch affirms Lafarge IDR at BB+

13 June 2012, Published under Cement News

Fitch has affirmed the Long-term Issuer Default Rating (IDR) and the senior unsecured rating of Lafarge at BB+ with a "stable" outlook. The affirmations reflect Fitch's view that the group will continue to reduce debt and improve its credit metrics in 2012, the agency said in a statement today. Fitch expects Lafarge's leverage ratio to fall below 4.0x by the end of 2012, a level that would be in line with the current rating. However, Fitch forecasts part of the envisaged EUR500m savings i...

Lafarge to accelerate cost cuts, lower debt

12 June 2012, Published under Cement News

Following the implementation of its new organisation, Lafarge has announced its 2012 to 2015 plan to cut costs by EUR1.3bn over the next four years and bring its net debt below EUR10bn as early as possible next year. The group is targeting a return on capital of more than eight per cent in 2015. Bruno Lafont, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Lafarge, said in a statement: "The plan we are presenting today will quickly drive higher returns for our shareholders, significantly strengthe...

Haver & Boecker acquires Newtec Bag Palletizing

31 May 2012, Published under Cement News

Haver & Boecker Holding GmbH has taken full control of Newtec Bag Palletizing by acquiring 100 per cent of its shares from the Newtec International Group SA. Newtec Bag Palletizing is a manufacturer of automatic palletising systems with headquarters in Illzach, France. It has over 1200 references, mainly in the chemical, agricultural and building materials industries. Newtec Bag Palletizing will be an independently operating Group company. This acquisition significantly strengthens the Hav...

Kercim to begin production in 2013

10 May 2012, Published under Cement News

Newly established cement company, Kercim will complete the construction of its plant, in Montoir-de-Bretagne, western France, by the end of this year. Production will start at the beginning of 2013. Kercim has invested EUR44m in the facility has a cement capacity of 600,000tpa. Abstracted from an original article in Les Echos

Lafarge shares rise on Hollande election

07 May 2012, Published under Cement News

Shares in Lafarge are among the top gainers on France’s CAC-40 index as investors expect government spending on social housing to increase under France’s newly elected president, Francois Hollande. Lafarge’s stock rose 2.4%, more than offsetting the sharp drop suffered on Friday following weak US economic data.

Vicat

03 May 2012, Published under Cement News

Vicat's first quarter turnover declined by 5.4% after a very strong first quarter in the previous year. The cement turnover was off by 4.4% to €255m, with cement shipments declining by 5.6% to 3.79Mt. Turnover in concrete and aggregates declined by 9.8% to €162m as aggregates shipments were down by 14.8% to 4.29Mt and ready-mixed concrete deliveries fell by 16.6% to 1.48Mm³. Other products and services registered a 2.7% increase in turnover to €68m. The lower volumes reflected less favoura...

Lafarge extends EUR1.2bn credit facility, France

20 March 2012, Published under Cement News

Lafarge said Tuesday it has extended its syndicated credit facility by two years from July 2013 to July 2015 for a total amount of EUR1.2bn. The extended facility supported by 24 lenders complements Lafarge’s bilateral lines of EUR2.2bn and brings total committed credit facilities to EUR3.4bn, Dow Jones reports. In total, these lines have an average maturity of 2.8 years and do not include any default clauses linked to financial covenants, credit ratings or Material Adverse Change (MAC).