November 13 (SeeNews) - Romanian blue-chip aluminium producer Alro [BSE:ALR] said on Wednesday that it turned to a consolidated net loss of 22.7 million lei ($5.2 million/4.8 million euro) in the first nine months of 2019 from a net profit of 223.5 million lei in the same period of last year.
Alro's sales dropped to 2.16 billion lei in the January-September period of the year from 2.30 billion lei in the comparable period of 2018, the company said in an interim financial statement.
Revenue from the primary aluminium production segment fell to 914.9 million lei in the review period from 974 million lei the year before, while revenue from alumina sales nearly halved to 114.8 million lei from 209.1 million lei.
This was partially offset by slightly higher processed aluminium sales - 1.07 billion lei versus 1.06 billion a year earlier, and an increase in bauxite sales to 54.8 million lei from 46.2 million lei.
Despite the lower sales revenue, cost of goods sold increased to 1.96 billion lei in the first three quarters of the year from 1.76 billion lei in the like period of 2018.
General, administrative and selling expenses fell to 208.8 million lei in the period under review from 227.8 million lei the year before.
Primary aluminium production rose by 1,136 tonnes to 241,840 t. in the first nine months of the year, while processed aluminium production was 1,842 t. higher at 79,164. The increase in both segments followed a strong third quarter.
Alumina production dropped to 357,286 t. in the review period from 423,633 t. a year earlier, while bauxite production was 42,999 t. lower at 1,527,688 t.
Alro became part of the Bucharest Stock Exchange (BVB) blue-chip BET index in March.
As at 8:55 CET on Wednesday, Alro shares traded 4.78% lower at 2.19 lei.
(1 euro = 4.76 lei)