After three quarters

Higher tax expenses increase Lenzing’s loss

Lenzing AG continues to struggle with high costs and comparatively low prices that can be achieved on the market.

(Bild: Scharinger Daniel)

Since the beginning of September, Lenzing AG has had a new boss in Rohit Aggarwal - and he still has a lot of work ahead of him to get the fiber producer back on track. After three quarters, the result after tax is minus 111.1 million euros. The loss is therefore even greater than at the same time a year ago.

"The Lenzing Group is continuing its recovery course. We continue to ensure strict cost management and focus on strengthening our global sales organization. At the same time, we are adapting our corporate organization to the changed market conditions", says Rohit Aggarwal, who has been CEO of the fiber group based in Upper Austria since September.

Rising logistics costs
The conditions under which he started are anything but easy: although fiber sales volumes are generally picking up again, the price of products remains low, the recovery of the markets has been sluggish, energy and raw material costs are high and logistics have even become more expensive.

All of this is also reflected in the company's figures. After three quarters of 2024, turnover increased to 1.96 billion euros and the operating result before depreciation and amortization also grew - to 263.7 million euros. At the same time, earnings after taxes were in the red at minus 111.1 million euros. In 2023, this figure was minus 96.7 million euros.

Excluded from the Austrian tax group
Lenzing AG explains the significant deterioration in the net result with a tax effect that had an impact here. Tax expenses amounted to EUR 77.7 million in the first three quarters of the year, which is over EUR 60 million more than in the same period in 2023. Reason: Because B&C Holding Austria is known to have reduced its shareholding, the company left the Austrian tax group and also had to pay B&C 25.8 million euros in tax allocation in accordance with an agreement. In addition, there were value adjustments and currency effects at individual Group companies because tax items had to be converted into other currencies.

On target for cost reduction
Unimpressed by this, the management believes that the fibre giant is on track, which also has to do with the savings and optimization package put together last year. "The implementation of our performance program is currently well ahead of schedule. We expect annual savings of more than 100 million euros. More than 50 percent of this will already be effective from this financial year," says CFO Nico Reiner.

In Austria, 100 full-time positions have been cut over the past one and a half years, and costs equivalent to a further 50 full-time jobs have been reduced through a temporary reduction in working hours.