ALRO Group registered a consolidated turnover of over 1.55 billion RON in first semester

ALRO, one of the largest vertically integrated aluminium producers in Europe, measured by production capacity, announces today its consolidated and separate financial results for the six months ended 30 June 2023. The Group’s turnover decreased to 1.55 billion RON in H1 2023, compared to 2.1 billion RON, as a result of lower LME quotations and temporarily shut down of the alumina refinery ALUM. The Group registered a net loss of 164 million RON in H1 2023, compared to a net profit of 15.3 million RON in H1 2022.

“Over the past 20 years, we invested more than USD 530 million in ALRO’s development and transformation and we are committed to continue on this path. While we temporarily stopped the production of alumina, based on economic factors, decided to sell the bauxite business for the same reasons, and reduced the electrolytic aluminium production, we invested in our ecorecycling facility, to support the production of aluminium with low electricity input. In fact, in June, we inaugurated a USD 11 million investment in technology and environment protection at the ecorecycling facility that will help us increase the output at this facility, with positive impact on production costs. We also continued our focus on the long-term programme to increase product efficiency by purchasing an aluminium plate processing line able to process our products as close as possible to customer size requirements, thus being even closer to our clients and their needs” said Marian Năstase, Chairman of the Board of Directors, ALRO. “And we will continue our long-term strategy focused on the same principles that supported our business so far and that helped us adapt quicker to all the changes and the downturns of the international aluminium environment, while preserving and expanding our client pool and our ever more sophisticated products portfolio,” added Marian Năstase.

The Group’s consolidated sales in H1 2023 were 1.55 billion RON, lower by 25% compared to the ones reported in a similar period of 2022. The decrease is due, on one side, to the lower LME quotation, which decreased by more than 700 USD/tonne compared to the similar period of last year. On the other side, 2023 was characterized by a slow-down in sales and by low demand in many industrial sectors.

The Group continued its investments in increasing the energy efficiency and, following a USD 11 million investment in its Eco-Recycling facility, it started up the second double chamber furnace, specialized in recycling scrap purchased from the dedicated market, and by the end of the year the (third) furnace will be launched in production, so that by the end of 2023 the Company’s recycling capacity will be increased to 100,000 tpa.

The investment programme for 2023 also aims at increasing the output of high and very high aluminium products, for sophisticated industries such as aero and auto.