BERLIN (dpa-AFX) - Specialty chemicals company Evonik Industries AG (EVK.DE) reported Tuesday that its first-quarter adjusted net income fell 5 percent from last year to 249 million euros with adjusted earnings per share of 0.53 euro.
Adjusted EBITDA, a key earnings metric, declined 3 percent year-over-year to 539 million euros. The adjusted EBITDA margin slipped to 16.4 percent from 17.1 percent a year ago.
The company attributed the decline in earnings to one-time start-up costs for new production facilities and a temporary bottleneck in the supply of raw materials in the Performance Materials segment.
Evonik's sales, however, rose 1 percent from last year to 3.29 billion euros.
Further, the company lifted its fiscal 2019 forecast for continuing operations due to the agreed sale of the methacrylates business.
Evonik now expects adjusted EBITDA and sales to be at least on the same level as last year. Earnings from the planned acquisition of the US company PeroxyChem are not included in the revised guidance.
In the year 2018, the continued operations posted an adjusted EBITDA of 2.15 billion euros and sales of 13.3 billion euros.
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