11 November 2010 18:52 [Source: ICIS news]
TORONTO (ICIS)--Verbio reported third-quarter earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) of €200,000 ($274,000), compared with EBIT of €800,000 in the year-earlier period, as sales, production and capacity utilisation fell while costs for key raw materials rose, the German biofuels producers said on Thursday.
Sales for the three months ended 30 September were €127m, down from €133m in the 2009 third quarter, Verbio said.
The company did not disclose the quarter's net profit but said that bottom-line "period results" for the three months were €900,000, compared with €1.3m in the year-earlier period.
The quarter’s production was 149,390 tonnes, compared with 163,329 tonnes in the 2009 third quarter. Plant capacity utilisation was 85.7%, down from 93.7% in the year-earlier quarter.
However, for the first nine months of 2010, Verbio recorded EBIT of €7.9m, compared with a loss of €10.7m in the year-earlier period.
Nine-month sales of €371m compared with €380m in the year-earlier period, while production rose 1.7% to 426,648 tonnes. Capacity utilisation averaged 81.6% during the first nine months ended 30 September, compared with 80.2% in the same period last year.
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Longer-term, Verbio would also benefit from the country’s new energy concept which calls for increased use of renewable energy, it added.
($1 = €0.73)