Berenberg announced on Friday that it had lowered its price target for Imerys from 51 to 46 euros, even though the financial intermediary continues to maintain a buy recommendation on the stock.
In a research note, the analyst states that he expects the French group's exposure to the construction sector, which stands at 40%, to penalize its results significantly in the second half of the year.
The professional adds that he is becoming progressively more pessimistic about the prospect of a turnaround by the end of the year in the industrial compounding business, forecasting demand at half-mast for some time to come, whether in Europe or the USA.
At the same time, the recovery of the Chinese economy has quickly run out of steam, says Berenberg, who does not foresee any upturn in growth in the immediate future.
In this context, the intermediary considers that the Ebitda target of between €630 and €650 million announced for this year could prove 'difficult to achieve'.
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As a world leader in mineral specialties for the industry, Imerys offers high-added-value business solutions for a wide range of sectors, from process industries to consumer goods or construction products. The group actively mobilizes its knowledge of applications, technological expertise and materials science know how to provide high-end solutions that value its mineral resources, develop formulations or produce synthetic minerals. All these actions bring about essential properties to its customers' products and their performance such as refractoriness, toughness, conductivity, opacity, durability, purity, lightness, filtration, absorption, or hydrophobicity. Imerys is strongly committed to responsible developmentin particular, to contribute to the development of environmentally friendly products and processes. The activity is organized around 2 areas:
- Performance Minerals: the segment brings together three geographical business areas - Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA), America and Asia/Pacific (APAC). This segment encompasses functional additives that give unique properties to the products they compose. It serves the plastics, rubber, paint and coatings, filtration, ceramic materials, renewable energy, paper and cardboard, food, health and cosmetic industries;
- Materials and High Temperature Solutions: the segment, managed globally, brings together two business areas - High Temperature Solutions and Refractories, Abrasives & Construction. This segment facilitates production processes involving high temperatures. It serves the refractory, foundry, metals, abrasives and building chemicals markets.
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