In 2018, Surteco Group’s consolidated sales at Euro 699 million were not only slightly above the year-earlier figures (Euro 690 million), it were also above the last projected range of Euro 685 to Euro 695 million, as the company said in the press release received by Lesprom Network.
Earnings before financial result and income tax (EBIT) were impacted negatively by one-off expenses amounting to a total of Euro 6.1 million in the reporting year for the optimisation programm announced in October 2018. As a result of this and primarily on account of the significantly increased cost of materials, an EBIT of Euro 32.2 million was achieved in 2018 (2017: Euro 44.7 million). EBIT adjusted by one-off expenses amounted to Euro 38.3 million. This is also situated within the scope of the last forecast at between Euro 37 and Euro 39 million.
While the Business Unit Paper suffered under the declining demand from important customer sectors and fell significantly short of the targets defined by the Group itself, the Business Unit Plastics succeeded in achieving the expected increase in sales due to the consolidation of the Probos-Group for the full finance year. Since owing to exchange-rate conditions the financial result was significantly better than in the previous year, the fall in pre-tax profit to Euro 27.1 million (2017: Euro 33.5 million) was less than in the case of EBIT.
"2018 was significantly more challenging for Surteco than originally anticipated at the beginning of the year. On account of the significantly declining demand as the year continued and the unexpected higher material costs, we were unable to achieve our original targets. We responded immediately and introduced measures to reduce costs already at the beginning of the second half-year. Following an increasing decline in demand, we launched an optimisation program in the third quarter to adjust our structures and personnel costs, which will have an effect on the 2019 financial year. The on-off expenses are included in the result for 2018," commented Dr. Herbert Müller, Chairman of the Board of Management of Surteco GROUP SE, on future development.
Surteco Group SE is a holding company for the leading national and international brands for surface technology. The comprehensive product portfolio includes papers printed with decor designs, impregnated materials, release papers, decorative flat foils and edgebandings based on specialist technical papers and plastics.
