Austrian steelmaker Voestalpine AG has posted a net profit of €1.3 billion for the financial year 2021-22 ended March 31, compared to a net profit of €31.7 million recorded in the previous financial year. In the given financial year, the revenues of the company amounted to €14.9 billion, up 36.9 percent year on year. In the given period, the company’s EBITDA was €2.3 billion, up by 109.1 percent year on year.
These are the best results in the company’s history with revenues and net profit being at all-time highs, despite an extremely challenging environment resulting from the pandemic, supply chain disruptions, huge rises in the prices of raw materials and energy, and finally the impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
According to the company statement, the world’s most advanced special steel plant at the company’s Kapfenberg site will gradually be commissioned this summer. Despite an exceptionally difficult operating environment and delivery bottlenecks in almost all sectors, work on the investment project continued without disruption. The plant will produce 205,000 mt of special steels for the international aerospace, oil and natural gas, and automotive industries.
Voestalpine stated that the volatile raw materials and energy prices as well as future developments regarding the pandemic further deepen the uncertainty. So far, China has consistently maintained its zero-Covid strategy. This might lead to temporary bottlenecks in global supply chains during the current business year. The company expects EBITDA for the financial year 2022-23 of between €1.8 billion and €2 billion, assuming that the global economy will cool off but will not suffer any additional major economic distortions due to the Ukraine war; due to new, aggressive Coivd-19 waves; or due to large-scale disruptions of international supply chains.