12 November 2019
The net profits of Saudi Arabia's cement companies listed on the local bourse rocketed by nearly five times in the first nine months of 2019 following a surge in projects and their exports, a local newspaper said on Tuesday.

From around 345.9 million Saudi riyals ($92.24 million) in the first nine months of 2018, the net earnings of the 14 listed firms leapt to nearly 1.726 billion riyals ($460.25 million) in the first nine months of this year, the Arabic language daily Alyoum said.

Citing company balance sheets results, the report showed the combined sales revenues of the firms also jumped by around 36 percent to 6.541 billion riyals ($1.744 billion) from 4.809 billion riyals ($1.282 billion) in the same period.

"Industry sources said all cement firms recorded profits this year, unlike last year when seven companies suffered from losses...they attributed the better results to an improvement in domestic cement demand due to a surge in public projects this year as part of Vision 2030," the report said.

A government decision to partially lift a long-standing ban on cement exports and slash export fees for cement firms also allowed them to perform better, it added.

Saudi Arabia, which accounts for a quarter of the Arab economy, is the largest regional cement producers, with output capacity of nearly 60 million tonnes a year.

(Writing by Nadim Kawach; Editing by Anoop Menon)

(anoop.menon@refinitiv.com)

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