2021 Half Year Results

Half Year Results for the six months ended 30 June 2021

Strong commercial performance, supported by recovering end markets and market share gains  

Vesuvius plc, a global leader in molten metal flow engineering and technology, announces its unaudited results for the six months ended 30 June 2021.  

 ⁽¹⁾ Underlying basis is at constant currency and excludes separately reported items and the impact of acquisitions and disposals.

⁽²⁾ For definitions of non-GAAP measures, refer to Note 16 in the Condensed Group Financial Statements.

Half Year 2021 Highlights

• Revenue of £808.1m, an increase of 18% on an underlying basis, reflecting the ongoing recovery in both our Steel and Foundry Divisions across most geographies and all end markets
• Strong underlying sales growth in both Steel Flow Control (+21%) and Foundry (+22%), supported by the end market rebound and market share gains, with more moderate growth in Advanced Refractories (+9%) where priority was given to price increases over volumes   
• Trading profit of £73.3m, an increase of 54% on an underlying basis, with return-on-sales up 220bps to 9.1%
• H1 2021 trading profit impacted by £10.3m in excess freight costs due to global supply chain disruption
• Selling price increases compensated raw material costs but did not fully mitigate H1 excess freight costs
• Focus on market share growth and medium-term market opportunities from:
• £28m capacity expansion in Steel Flow Control in Asia and EMEA, to be operational from late 2022
• 12 new products launched, underlining the benefits of maintaining our industry-leading R&D investment during 2020
• Continued strong working capital performance with trade working capital/sales having improved to 20.7% at June 2021 (12m average), versus 23.2% at December 2020 and 24.6% at June 2020 
• Improvement in our Net debt/EBITDA to 1.1x at June 2021, versus 1.2x at December 2020, and refinancing of our revolving credit facility ("RCF") in early July which was increased in size from £300m to £385m
• Interim dividend of 6.2p (2020: 3.1p), an increase of 100% versus 2020

Comment from Patrick André, CEO:

"Vesuvius delivered a strong commercial performance in H1 2021, supported by the continued improvement in end markets and market share gains in Steel Flow Control and Foundry. While we continue to experience inflationary pressure in certain raw materials and freight, this will be offset in H2 through incremental selling price increases currently being implemented. Consequently, trading profit in the second half is expected to be similar to the first half. Overall, our expectation for the full year is unchanged. 

Looking beyond the ongoing transition period of the pandemic recovery, we expect continuing structural growth in our end markets of steel and foundry to present attractive organic growth opportunities, supported by the strategic expansion of our Steel Flow Control production capacities in Asia and EMEA.

We remain confident that we will deliver further meaningful improvement in our financial performance in the coming years, based on our optimised manufacturing footprint, our ongoing R&D investment and new product pipeline, as well as our entrepreneurial and decentralised business model."

Presentation of H1 2021 Results

Vesuvius management will make a presentation to analysts and investors on 29 July, 2021 at 10.00 UK time at the London Stock Exchange, 10 Paternoster Square, London EC4M 7LS. For those unable to attend, the event will be livestreamed and can be accessed by clicking here. Participants can also join via an audio conference call. Please click here to register.  Once registered, you will be provided with the information needed to join the conference, including dial-in numbers and passcodes. Be sure to save this information in your calendar.