Italian plantmaker Danieli has stated that project delays due to the political turmoil in North Africa and the Middle East will slow down its sales and profit growth and hit its order book this year.
Danieli expects revenues at €2.8-3.0 billion and net profit at €150-200 million in its 2010/2011 financial year, in line with the previous year. Its chairman and chief executive officer Gianpietro Benedetti commented, "The results could have been much better but we had to suspend some works in Egypt and in the Gulf area because of the political situation there."
"The Gulf area has stopped but it should recover in the next three to five months if nothing else happens there," Benedetti said.
Accordingly, Danieli's order book, which stood at about €3.3 billion in the first half of the group's financial year, is expected to fall to about €3 billion at the end of the financial year in June because of the delays.
In particular, Danieli has put on hold two projects in Egypt to build steel plants with a total capacity of 2 million mt, and had briefly suspended a third project which has already been resumed, Benedetti said.
The group has also suspended for about 10 days its nearly completed work at a 2.5 million mt steel plant in Japan it has been building for Tokyo Steel, after the devastating earthquake which hit the country.
In its domestic market, Danieli is considering a €200-250 million investment in its Italian unit ABS to boost the quality of the special steels it produces, Benedetti said.