Irish packaging manufacturer IPL Plastics reported a profit increase of 22% in the second quarter of 2019, against the same period last year, despite a 5.4% drop in revenue.
For the three months ended June 30, 2019, IPL reported gross profits of $37.8 million, despite only achieving revenues of $168.6 million.
IPL’s net income for in the quarter was $8.5 million, an increase of $11.1 million from a loss of $2.6 million in Q2 2018.
It said that this growth was primarily due to large one-off costs associated with the IPO it made in Canada last year.
It was also boosted by the contribution from the acquisition of Loomans Group and volume growth in the Consumer Packaging Solutions (CPS) division in North America.
Strong Progress
Alan Walsh, CEO of IPL Plastics, praised the company’s progress in rebuilding margins during the second quarter, “allowing us to deliver very strong earnings growth across the group”.
“That growth was underpinned by improvements in our operations, lower resin costs and the contribution from the Loomans acquisition,” he said.
IPL said that its revenues were hit by negative foreign exchange translation impact from the strengthening U.S. dollar, temporary trading delays as detailed in Q1 2019 in the Returnable Packaging Solutions (RPS) division.
It was also impacted by a reduction in environmental container rollouts in its Large Format Packaging and Environmental Solutions (LF&E) division.
“Following a strong Adjusted EBITDA performance at our RPS division in Q2 2019, we continue to expect full-year adjusted earnings there to be at least in line with 2018,” Walsh continued.
Walsh added that the company’s focus remains on operational improvement initiatives, generating strong and growing cash flows, and on reducing our Net Debt to Adjusted EBITDA ratio.
“We expect that given the progress we have made year to date, as well as the underlying robustness of our business, we will deliver a solid improvement in the Group’s trading performance for the full year,” he concluded.
© 2019 Checkout – your source for the latest Irish retail news. Article by Aidan O’Sullivan. Click sign-up to subscribe to Checkout.
