Hanson upbeat despite brick weakness

Industrial products group Hanson today estimated volumes in its UK brickmaking business fell 20% in the first six months of the year.

The company blamed the downturn on weak demand in the repair, maintenance and improvement sector, but added that the company as a whole continued to perform well with good progress expected over the rest of this year.

Hanson said there were some signs that the UK brick market may have reached the bottom of the cycle, although it pointed out no significant improvement in demand was expected in the second half of the year.

It has offset the brick volumes downturn and pressure from rising costs by increasing prices, as well as through production cutbacks and closures, although it did not provide further details in a trading statement today.

Operating profits at UK building products in the first half of the year are expected to be around half of the figure achieved 12 months ago, it added.

Across the group, Hanson said it expected to report an increase in operating profits of around 10%, compared with £197.3m (€285.5m) a year ago.

Much of the improvement has come from North American, where the performance of its two divisions in the region was described as “excellent”.