More confirmation of strong Potash demand (UPCO needs to get product out of the ground and to market ASAP!):
Strong Potash Demand Makes K+S Confident About 2011
By Hilde Messer and Heide Oberhauser-Aslan
Published November 11, 2010
| Dow Jones Newswires
Print Email Share Comments (0) Text Size FRANKFURT -(Dow Jones)- Specialty and standard fertilizers supplier K+S AG (SDF.XE) said Thursday that it is lifting its 2010 sales guidance to the upper end of the range, adding that it expects a moderate rise in sales and a significant rise in operating and net profit in 2011 on the back of strong potash demand.
"The development in our most important business segments, Potash and Magnesium Products and Salt, in the third quarter was better than expected," Chief Executive Norbert Steiner said in a statement.
The Kassel-based company now expects sales at between EUR4.8 billion and EUR5 billion from a previous forecast of between EUR4.6 billion and EUR5 billion. In 2009, sales reached EUR3.6 billion. It added it expects earnings per share in 2010 to be between EUR1.95 and EUR2.10 compared with EUR0.56 in 2009.
The group confirmed its full-year outlook for operating earnings of between EUR630 million and EUR670 million, which it increased only last week.
It expects sales volumes in the potash and magnesium products segment to come in between 6.7 million and 6.9 million tons in 2010, and of just over 7 million tons for 2011. For 2011, it expects average prices to increase moderately.
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The average prices in the potash and magnesium products business receded in the third-quarter, as announced by the company. The average price in the third-quarter world-wide was EUR265.8 a ton, after EUR268.7 a ton in the April to June period. In the fourth quarter, the company expects prices to be stable.
In the potash and magnesium products business segment, demand for potash fertilizers normalized. Sales in the quarter rose 23% to EUR417.8 million, while operating earnings increased 47% to EUR79 million. The company added it had a high capacity utilization rate.
In the salt operations, last year's acquisition of U.S. salt company Morton Salt significantly buoyed sales and earnings. Sales soared to EUR305.2 million, compared to EUR123.2 million a year earlier. Operating earnings for the July to September period rose to EUR31.8 million, after EUR13.5 million a year before. In addition to the positive consolidation effect of Morton Salt, K+S benefited from an early stocking-up business for de-icing salt.
The company expects sales in the salt business to around to 22 million tons this year.
Third-quarter net profit soared to EUR76.8 million from EUR3.7 million a year earlier and sales increased 52% to EUR1.06 billion.
