Cascades Reports Results for the Third Quarter of 2021
"Our third quarter performance reflects the ongoing dynamic nature of the North American macro environment,” said Mario Plourde
Cascades Inc. reports its unaudited financial results for the three-month period ended September 30, 2021.
Commenting the company’s results, Cascades’ President and CEO, Mario Plourde, said:
“Our third quarter performance reflects the ongoing dynamic nature of the North American macro environment and the announced production impact in our containerboard segment related to water effluent treatment system issues at our Niagara Falls complex. We are encouraged with our results given this context, and with the sequential improvement in our tissue business. We continued to see inflationary pressures on input costs, notably raw materials, but also in labour, transportation and energy, across our operations in the third quarter, the effects of which were partially offset by the roll-out of announced price increases and our continued cost management initiatives.
Sequentially, in containerboard, good demand levels and realized benefits from the continued roll-out of price increases helped to offset higher raw material prices and the impact from reduced production at our Niagara Falls complex, which reduced our sequential OIBD by $26 million and $10 million, respectively. Specialty packaging results reflected solid demand and incremental benefits from price increases which, combined, largely mitigated higher costs.
On the tissue side, demand and pricing trends were more positive sequentially, while higher input costs, notably raw materials and transportation, remained headwinds.
At the corporate level, we successfully completed the monetization of our majority 57.6% equity position in Reno de Medici in late October. Our exit from European boxboard markets, recent 50% dividend increase and ongoing share buy-back program through which 1.65 million shares were repurchased in the third quarter, underscore our commitment to creating long term value for the Corporation and our Shareholders. As part of our focus to reinforce our financial flexibility and optimize our capital structure through a strategic deployment of capital, we subsequently completed the repurchase of US$299 million of our long-term notes on November 9, 2021.”
Discussing near-term outlook, Plourde commented, “Looking ahead, we are forecasting sequentially stable results for the fourth quarter, with the impact of inflationary pressures on input costs largely mitigated by steady demand and the roll-out of price increases in our business segments. In containerboard, solid demand and ongoing flow-through of the third price increase are expected to offset higher raw material costs and inflationary headwinds in input costs. Likewise, good demand and price increases in Specialty packaging are expected to counter cost pressure. Finally, considering usual seasonal softness, we are forecasting results and demand levels in our tissue papers segment to be stable sequentially, with continued benefits from the ongoing roll-out of sales price increases countering higher raw material prices and pressures on costs.”
To read the complete report, visit Cascades Inc. website: www.cascades.com/
