The country's top zinc producer, Chelyabinsk Zinc Plant, reported Thursday a 260 percent rise in revenues in January to September due to high zinc prices and higher sales volumes.
«Revenues increased by 260 percent ... in the first nine months of 2006 as compared with the same period of 2005», Chelyabinsk said in a statement.
«The main reasons for this increase were the significant increase in London Metal Exchange zinc prices [an average of $2,965 per ton, against $1,296 per ton for the same period last year] and growth in the volume of zinc sales».
Chelyabinsk net profit calculated to International Financial Reporting Standards was $80.8 million in the first nine months of 2006, compared with a loss of $1.4 million a year ago.
The plant's earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortization rose to $130.9 million from $10.3 million.
Chelyabinsk sold 99,953 tons of pure zinc and zinc in alloys in the first nine months of 2006, up from 72,993 tons a year ago.
The increase in revenues was also attributable to a higher pricing premium for domestic sales in 2006 that was partially offset by a decline in the volume of domestic sales as a proportion of total sales volume, the statement said.
Chelyabinsk produced 110,178 tons of zinc from January to September, 38 percent more than the 79,754 tons produced in the same period last year.
CZP's subsidiary Nova Zinc, the operator of the Akzhal zinc ore mine in Kazakhstan, mined 904,208 tons of ore from January to September, with the average zinc content in the ore of 2.9 percent and lead content of 0.63 percent.
Production of zinc concentrate by Nova Zinc totaled 24,229 tons of zinc in zinc concentrate. Revenues for the period also included $37.8 million (or 9.7 percent of total revenues) generated by Nova Zinc, from the date of its consolidation into Chelyabinsk results on April 1, 2006.
Chelyabinsk is responsible for approximately 60 percent of Russi's zinc production volume. In 2005, the plant produced 116,000 tons of the metal. |
