4Q 2012 income attributable to the Company was $8.2 million. These results included restructuring charges of $0.9 million, foreign currency revaluation losses of $4 million, and net unfavorable income tax adjustments of $0.1 million.
4Q 2013 gross profit was $72.4 million, or 38.2% of net sales, compared to $79 million, or 40.6% of net sales, in the same period of 2012.
President and CEO Joe Morone said, “Due primarily to softer-than-expected market conditions in North America, the anticipated 4Q rebound in Machine Clothing failed to materialize. As expected, sales held firm in Europe and Asia, continuing the trend of the past several quarters. But in North America–our largest and most profitable market–they weakened sharply, which in turn, dragged down gross margins. While full-year performance in North America was excellent, in 4Q sales were 7.5% lower than in 3Q, and more than 10% lower than in Q4 2012. November was especially soft, as certain producers in the containerboard market, our largest market segment, took substantial downtime in order to reduce their inventories. We had been expecting some decline due to seasonal end-of-the-year inventory reductions. But we had not anticipated the magnitude of the slowdown in the containerboard market, where in some cases, customers pulled forward downtime that had been scheduled for 2014.
“Nonetheless, we continue to expect a strong first half for MC in 2014. This view is bolstered by strong MC orders in Q4, improvement in North American containerboard production in December, and strong North American MC shipments in January. In particular, we expect first-half sales in North America to be much stronger than 4Q levels, and to be steady or somewhat higher in both Asia and Europe. More generally, we view the macro-economy, rather than structural or competitive factors, as the most important driver of our MC performance in 2014.”
Albany International is a global advanced textiles and materials processing company, with two core businesses. Machine Clothing is the world’s leading producer of custom-designed fabrics and belts essential to production in the paper, nonwovens, and other process industries. Albany Engineered Composites is a rapidly growing supplier of highly engineered composite parts for the aerospace industry.
