Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal, the world's largest steelmaker, has announced its financial results for the first half of the current year.
During the first half of the year, ArcelorMittal posted a net profit of $3.05 billion, rising by 32 percent year on year. The company’s sales revenues increased by 17.5 percent year on year to $39.18 billion, primarily due to higher average steel selling prices and higher steel shipments which increased by 1.3 percent to 43.1 million mt compared to the first half of the previous year. ArcelorMittal registered an EBITDA of $5.58 billion in the given period, up 28.5 percent year on year.
ArcelorMittal's crude steel production remained almost stable at 46.5 million mt in the first half this year, while its iron ore production increased by 1.4 percent year on year to 29.1 million mt.
“The outlook for the second half of the year is encouraging as we anticipate current favorable market conditions continuing and are well positioned to capitalize on this from our leadership position across many key markets. We believe improvements in underlying industry fundamentals are sustainable, although there is still more to be done to thoroughly address the issue of global overcapacity. We will retain a deleveraging bias, whilst also pursuing selective opportunities to strengthen the foundations of sustainable value creation," stated Lakshmi N. Mittal, ArcelorMittal chairman and CEO.