MANILA -- Global Ferronickel Holdings, Inc. (FNI) on Tuesday reported its net income reached PHP105.3 million for the first half of 2019 from a measly PHP4 million it recorded in the same period last year.
Its revenue also grew by 24.1 percent year-on-year to PHP1.77 billion from PHP1.43 billion in the same period a year ago.
"We have taken advantage of favorable weather conditions and the improving prices of nickel and nickel ore. Our commitment to excellence and growing expertise in the mining business have allowed us to increase our revenue and improve on our profitability,” FNI President Dante Bravo said in a statement.
From January to June 2019, FNI, the second largest nickel ore exporter in the country, shipped 33 vessels of nickel ore, equivalent to 1.8 million wet metric tons (WMT), which is 16.9 percent higher than the ore shipment during the same period last year.
With the company’s deliberate push for the sale of higher-grade nickel ores to take advantage of better prices, the resulting product mix for the first semester of the year stood at 39 percent low-grade and 61 percent medium-grade, as against 43 percent low-grade and 57 percent medium-grade in the same period in 2018.
FNI has also shipped two vessels of 1.65 percent nickel ores compared to just one vessel in 2018.
Average realized prices increased by 14.8 percent for low-grade ores and 1.6 percent for medium-grade ores.
On the other hand, the corresponding average cash cost registered at PHP796 per WMT, which is 5.8 percent increase from the prior period.
Despite the increase, FNI said margins remained healthy as improvement in top-line surpasses the increase in the overall cost.
The company posted better earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) and net income margins at 20.3 percent and 5.9 percent, respectively, as against the previous period’s margins of 17.5 percent and 0.3 percent, respectively, it added.
Systematic operations, boost in mining capacity due to the increasing number of mining equipment, proper planning and foresight, efficient stockpiling, and having the flexibility to adapt to changing day-to-day situations, enabled the mining firm to achieve favorable outcomes.
As testament to its operational excellence, FNI closed the first half of the year at a net dispatch position of about USD215,000.
“Despite the challenges we’ve faced in recent years, we continue to thrive and remain positive in the overall health of the industry. Given the limited nickel supply and increasing end-product demand worldwide, we believe that the demand-supply fundamentals bode well for the company,” Bravo said. (PNA)
