The upswing is continuing at Masterplast

Masterplast Nyrt. maintained its upswing in an improving branch environment, one of the leading construction material producer-distributor companies in the region increased its income by 6 percent in the second quarter compared to one year earlier. The company achieved a turnover of 23.76 million euros in the April-June period, the Hungarian, Polish and Slovak markets, where sales expanded to a considerable extent, played a key role in the good result.

In Hungary, the most important market for the company, an income of more than 7.5 million euros was attained in the second quarter, which means a 21 percent increase when reckoned over the year. The sales rose by 30 percent on the Polish market, and 18 percent in Slovakia. In the April-June period, Romania was the second biggest market for Masterplast, where a 3 percent increase in turnover was achieved. At the same time, on the export markets, reckoned the segment with the third greatest weight, the company’s sales fell by 7 percent.

The largest fraction of the Masterplast Group turnover was given by the facade insulation elements and systems, the company attaining a 10 percent growth in this segment. This was also influenced by the fact that building contractors made large purchases in the second quarter, due to the rise in raw material prices.

Masterplast Nyrt. closed the second quarter with an EBIDTA result of 1.63 million euros, this meaning a 5 percent fallback compared with the previous year. The company’s operating result exceeded the business plan, approaching 1.45 million euros, although it fell short of the second quarter of 2016. Due chiefly to the launch of the Serbian fibreglass mesh manufacture, as well as the wage increases in Hungary, the company’s expenditures of a personal nature grew by 23 percent in the second quarter of 2017 compared with the base period, while the increase in costs was 24 percent in total. Masterplast further increased its staff headcount, the company employing 879 persons at the end of June 2017 (of which the new Subotica fibreglass mesh works employed 309 people), compared with 758 persons one year earlier.

Masterplast Nyrt. closed the second quarter with an after-tax result of 848 thousand euros, which fell short of the previous year’s figure by 600 thousand euros. Due primarily to the weakening of the quarterly exchange rate for the Ukrainian hryvnia and the Russian ruble, the financial operations suffered a loss of 149 thousand euros, whilst in the second quarter of 2016 the company demonstrated a profit of close to 200 thousand euros.

The Masterplast Group’s Subotica fibreglass mesh manufacturing investment is making good progress, the hall construction and technology installation associated with the third phase of the project are proceeding according to plan. The manufacturing hall is complete, all production equipment has arrived and installation of the new machinery was begun at the end of the quarter. The facility completed with an investment of 8.4 million euros will reach its full capacity in 2018, then the Vojvodina factory will be capable of producing 70 million square metres of fibreglass mesh every year.

“In the second quarter, we typically experienced favourable tendencies on our markets. In Hungary, the market with the greatest weight, statistics continue to show branch growth, which is due to energetics investments made with European Union resources, as well as the state home creation scheme (CSOK). The number of housing construction permits issued also grew significantly, which is a favourable portent for the rest of the year in this segment. The further improvement in the branch environment, the increasing output of our own manufacturing capacity, as well as commodity supply in the main season, may mean that we outstrip our income plans formulated for this year, whilst meeting our target related to the operating result” – said Dávid Tibor, president of Masterplast Nyrt.