US PolyOne swings to Q4 net income of $24m

04 February 2010 13:10  [Source: ICIS news]

LONDON (ICIS news)--PolyOne swung to a fourth-quarter net income of $24.0m (€17.3m), compared with a net loss of $282.6m reported in the same quarter of 2008, due partly to better margins and lower sales costs, the US polymer materials and services company said on Thursday.

Sales for the three months ended 31 December 2009 were up 1.9% year on year at $552.2m, the company said.

“During the first half of 2009 we focused on reducing costs and working capital and we achieved substantial gross margin expansion and improved cash flow as a result,” said Stephen Newlin, chairman, president and CEO of PolyOne.

“With demonstrated sustainable earnings improvement, we were able to increase our focus on winning profitable new business and growing the top line during the second half of the year,” Newlin added.

PolyOne said that during the fourth quarter of 2009, the company’s cash declined $18m for reasons including an $11m contribution to its pension funds as well as the purchase of specialty healthcare company New England Urethane for $11.5m.

Polyone said it was cautiously optimistic on the outlook of the economy and believed it would soon see a positive increase in business.

“We acknowledge government stimulus programmes may have helped the economy in the back half of 2009 and this may not continue this year,” said Robert Patterson, PolyOne’s senior vice president and chief financial officer.

“Nevertheless, we expect to grow our strategic platform earnings through top-line growth in 2010,” he added.

PolyOne also announced that from 1 January it had placed regional presidents in Europe and Asia to coordinate and direct activities in those areas.

“Broadly, we are changing our specialty platform from regionally organised to globally organised and we are globalising our sourcing function,” said Newlin.

($1 = €0.72)

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