MHP’s First-Quarter Profit Doubles on Chicken Price, Exports
Mironovskiy Hleboproduct SA (MHPC), a Ukrainian poultry and grain producer, said first-quarter profit more than doubled from a year ago on increased chicken prices and exports.
Net income jumped to $48 million from January through March, compared with $20 million a year earlier, as the average chicken price climbed by 31 percent, the Kyiv, Ukraine-based company, said today in an e-mailed statement. Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization increased by 48 percent to $84 million, according to the statement.
“Demand remains strong as chicken is the cheapest kind of meat in Ukraine,” Chief Financial Officer Viktoria Kapelyushnaya said in a phone interview in Kyiv today. “We think that the price will stay at its current level and we see our EBITDA at $450 million to $460 million this year.”
Chicken exports increased by almost 70 percent in the first quarter and amounted to around 12 percent of total sales. The company added Uzbekistan to its export markets this year, Kapelyushnaya said.
MHP expects to harvest grain from 250,000 hectares this year, according to the statement. Its EBITDA from the grain business will probably remain unchanged from 2011 and total around $120 million, Kapelyushnaya said.
MHP’s net debt totaled at $854 million at the end of the first quarter and was mainly denominated in dollars.
“Our foreign currency revenue is more than enough to service and repay our debts,” Kapelyushnaya said, adding that net debt may be $900 million to $1 billion at the end of the year.
bloomberg