Kardemir reported a 5% on-year increase in primary product sales in the first half of 2019 to 1.19 million tonnes, despite a -3% drop in liquid steel output to 1.16mt, Kallanish notes.

Billet shipments increased 13% to 501,000t, profile deliveries surged 68% to 239,000t and bar and wire rod sales rose 6% to 186,000t. The latter recovered from a -2% decline after the first quarter. Round bar sales, however, dropped -13% to 241,000t and rail sales fell -80% to 14,000t. The average sales price of billet fell to $452/tonne in the June quarter from $486/t in the year-earlier period and wire rod was down to $518/t from $564/t.

Revenue surged 28% in H1 to TRY 3.28 billion ($585.5 million), but net profit plunged -61% to TRY 170m due to much higher cost of sales. Ebitda margin fell to 13.9% from 33%. Ebitda per tonne did, however, improve to $75/t in the second quarter from $62/t in Q1. Scrap accounted for 15% of H1 raw materials costs versus 13% in H1 2018, with iron ore comprising 34% versus 36%.

Kardemir utilised 66.2% of its 3.5 million t/year liquid steel capacity in H1 versus 68.6% a year earlier, while 2.85m t/y continuous casting capacity utilisation was down to 79.9% from 82.6%. The 831,600 t/y rebar and rod mill utilisation rose to 43.7% from 39.4%, but the 700,000 t/y continuous rolling mill utilisation fell to 68.7% from 81%. The 450,000 t/y rail mill utilisation rose to 94.1% from 90.3%.