Gypsum industry news

Bulgaria: Bulgarian gypsum producer Gips has announced that its consolidated loss widened by 33% to Euro1.6m in January - September 2014. Consolidated revenues decreased by 5.0% year-on-year to Euro2.45m in the first nine months of 2014. Its operating loss widened to Euro431,239 during the period, from Euro88,500 in 2013.

US: Continental Building Products (CBP) has announced that its secondary public offering of 7,000,000 shares of common stock, which was announced earlier this week, will be priced at US$14.75/share. All of the shares are being sold by its largest stockholder, an affiliate of Lone Star Funds. The underwriters have a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 1,050,000 shares of common stock from the selling stockholder. The offering is expected to close on 25 November 2014.

India: FRBPL, a joint venture of Fertilisers and Chemicals Travancore Limited (FACT) and Rashtriya Chemicals and Fertilisers Limited (RCF), has launched the world's largest load-bearing gypsum wallboard panels, which measure 12m x 3m and 124mm thick. The panels are lightweight and waterproof. According to Ananth Kumar, the Union minister for Chemicals and Fertilisers, the panels could revolutionise India's infrastructure sector.

US: Continental Building Products (CBP) has announced the launch of a secondary public offering of 7,000,000 shares of common stock to be offered by the company's largest stockholder, an affiliate of Lone Star Funds. The underwriters will have a 30-day option from the date of the offering to purchase up to an additional 1,050,000 shares of common stock from the selling stockholder. CBP will not receive any proceeds from the sale of the shares.

Belarus: According to Volma's chairman of the board of directors, Yuri Goncharov, a contract with Germany's Grenzebach for the supply of modernisation equipment for the Belgips plant in Minsk has been concluded. The plant will be operational by the middle of 2015.

Under presidential decree No.34, which was signed on 16 January 2014, Volma was required to invest Euro43m to modernise the Belgips plant by 1 July 2018, including Euro24.7m by 30 June 2016. Within the funding, Volma had to transfer at least Euro2.5m to Belgips. "We will meet the investment project deadline, " Goncharov noted.

According to local media, Belgips' business is being threatened by multiple factors. The supply volumes to Russia haven't changed, but the product prices have fallen by 20 - 25%. There's also a negative effect on Belgips' position by the Polish companies that, according to Goncharov, offer their products on the Belarusian market at much cheaper prices than their domestic ones. There are also challenges regarding the procurement of raw materials.

In response, Volma plans to improve the quality of products through modernisation of the operating facilities. It will also decrease its prices. However, according to Goncharov, prices cannot get much lower. Volma also plans to improve its raw materials supply chain via imports. Goncharov expects to see Belgips in profit in 2015.