LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Full-year production of crude steel and semi-finished products from Evraz dropped following repairs to a blast furnace in Siberia.
In the fourth quarter of 2018, consolidated crude steel output was flat on the third quarter at 3.1m tonnes leading to production falling 7.3% for the year to 13m tonnes.

Sales volumes of semi-finished products fell 16% in the quarter as production decreases in August and September amid capital repairs of one blast furnace at ZSMK, eastern-most steel mill in Russia and the largest steel mill in the Siberian region, led to late shipment of products. Year on year, sales volumes were down 18% to 4.7m tonnes.

Finished product sales edged down 1.6% in the final quarter, amid the seasonal reduction in volumes of construction and railway products. On the previous year, finished product sale rose 3.5% to 7.5m tonnes.

Production of raw coking coal increased 15.3% in the fourth quarter to 6.9m tonnes and coking coal sales grew 4.7% amid favourable market conditions and higher shipments to deliver outstanding volumes from the prior quarter.

External iron ore product sales rose 7.7% in the quarter as ZSMK required less feedstock during the repairs of its blast furnace, while stockpiles had also built up in the previous quarter. Year on year, iron ore sales were down 32% to 2m tonnes.

Vanadium sales dropped 17.9% in the quarter, mainly due to replenishing ferrovanadium stocks to serve 2019 requirements, meaning for 2018 sales were down 19% to 12.4m tonnes.

Evraz shares, of which are 30.5% owned by Chelsea FC owner Roman Abramovich and which were the second-best performer in the FTSE 100 last year, rose more than 2% to 498.4p on Thursday.

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