UPM-Kymmene Oyj (OTCPK:UPMKF) Q3 2024 Results Conference Call October 29, 2024 7:15 AM ET
Company Participants
Massimo Reynaudo – Chief Executive Officer
Tapio Korpeinen – Chief Financial Officer
Conference Call Participants
Ephrem Ravi – Citigroup
Cole Hathorn – Jefferies
Robin Santavirta – Carnegie
Charlie Muir-Sands – BNP Paribas Exane
Ramchandra Kamath – Barclays
Andrew Jones – UBS
Massimo Reynaudo
Hello, everyone. Welcome to UPM’s Quarter Three 2024 Results Webcast. My name is Massimo Reynaudo, I’m the CEO of UPM. Here with me is Tapio Korpeinen, the CFO.
Tapio Korpeinen
Hi to everyone on the line.
Massimo Reynaudo
Together, we will illustrate the main elements of the UPM performance last quarter and year-to-date. Let me start with the key elements that characterize the quarter. Our Q3 results improved both year-on-year and quarter-on-quarter with a good contribution from the fully ramped up Paso de los Toros pulp mill. The earnings improvement, albeit good, was lower than earlier expected as the market demand of our products slowed down after a strong start of the year. In this slower recovery environment, we are taking decisive actions to ensure the competitiveness of our businesses.
While this is important for our profitability, it will also support our growth ambitions going forward. Let’s see now this more in detail. Our quarter 3 sales decreased by 2% from last year. In fact, during the quarter, our volumes realized lower than earlier expected, and this impacted both sales and comparable EBIT in the quarter. Our comparable EBIT totaled €291 million or 11.5% of sales, and it grew 32% year-on-year or 60% sequentially from quarter 2.
So what happened during the quarter? Let’s start with the situation in Europe. As said before and most visibly in Europe, the demand slowed down for most of the UPM products after the strong start of the
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