"Vesuvius is a global leader in metal flow engineering, developing, manufacturing and marketing mission-critical ceramic consumable products and systems to demanding applications, primarily in the global steel and foundry industries. Vesuvius also supplies fabricated precious metals to the jewellery industry in Europe and has significant precious metals recycling operations."

Both Vesuvius Plc & Alent Plc are seperate companies created from the demerger of Cookson Plc in Dec 2012.

http://www.vesuvius.com/en/

Results for the year ended 31 December 2012 (unaudited)
Resilient financial performance delivered in a difficult second half trading environment:
· 2012 trading profit of £150.2m (including Precious Metals Processing), affected by Steel and Foundry trading environment being significantly weaker in second half (as previously announced)

· Final dividend of 9.5 pence per share, in line with guidance at demerger

· Free cash flow(1),(2) from continuing operations of £54.2m (2011: £32.1m)

· Year-end net debt(2) of £295m

Strategic transformation of Vesuvius into a focused, global leader in metal flow engineering:

· Restructuring programme well progressed across the Group, exiting low-margin business, reducing the cost base, improving operational flexibility and cash flow

· Successful demerger completed(3)

· Complete exit from Solar Crucibles business announced

· Discussions on disposal of Precious Metals Processing at an advanced stage

François Wanecq, Chief Executive of Vesuvius, commented:
"Vesuvius has demonstrated its resilience in the significantly weaker steel and foundry markets experienced in the second half of 2012. We have taken decisive action to exit low margin businesses and lower our fixed cost base, to drive profitability and cashflow. Since the year-end, we have decided to exit completely from the Solar Crucibles business.
We have clear market and technology leadership in both Steel and Foundry, a strong presence in developing markets, and opportunities to develop new higher value products and services for our customers. We will continue the drive to improve our operating efficiency, while maintaining our leadership in technology, innovation and global reach.
The Group is now positioned to increase margins, and as our end-markets start to strengthen, grow revenues. Our strong balance sheet and cash generation will enable us to continue to invest in our business and pursue further high value opportunities."

http://www.moneyam.com/action/news/showArticle?id=4559027

Disposal of Precious Metals Processing Division
Proposed share repurchase programme

Vesuvius plc ("Vesuvius" or the "Company"), a leading metal flow engineering company, announces that it has entered into an agreement to sell its Precious Metals Processing Division ("PMP") to Heimerle + Meule GmbH ("H + M"), a subsidiary of L. Possehl & Co, mbH ("Possehl") for a cash consideration of €56.8m, payable on completion.

The cash consideration will be subject to closing balance sheet adjustments. Completion, which is expected by the end of the first half of 2013, will be subject to conditions including approval by the European Commission and by the Supervisory Board of Possehl.

The majority of the disposal proceeds will be returned to shareholders through the on-market repurchase of shares. The balance of the proceeds will be used to reduce the Company's existing borrowings.

Commenting on the sale François Wanecq, Chief Executive of Vesuvius, said:

"Following the recent creation of Vesuvius plc through the demerger of Cookson, this is a further important strategic step for our company. It represents the sale of a non-core asset and the final exit from precious metals processing, leaving Vesuvius principally focused on our core competence of molten metal engineering, serving the global steel and foundry industries.

"It is also a very positive outcome for the Precious Metals Processing business and its employees, offering the opportunity to develop a long-term future within a group dedicated to the precious metals industry.

"As a result of this disposal, we intend to return the majority of the net proceeds to shareholders through an on market repurchase of shares, demonstrating our desire to exercise strong capital discipline and generate superior returns. Our strong balance sheet allows us to do this and still remain able to fund attractive growth opportunities."

BFN
John McDonough, Chairman, bought 50,000 shares in the company on the 27th March 2013 at a price of 355.24p. The Director now holds 50,000 shares.

StockMarketWire.com

Investec has upgraded its recommendation on Vesuvius (LON:VSVS) to "buy" from "hold" following the recent share price weakness. The City broker has lowered its price target slightly to 385 pence per share from 400 pence. The shares are down by nearly 8 per cent in the past month. Broker Forecast consensus data shows that the majority of brokers (69 per cent) have a less bullish opinion on the stocks near-term outlook and have a 'neutral' rating in place versus the remaining 31 per cent which rate the shares as a "buy".

BFN
Christer Gardell, Non Executive Director, bought 450,000 shares in the company on the 22nd April 2013 at a price of 325.00p. The Director now holds 56,443,446 shares.

Completion of disposal and confirmation of share repurchase programme

Vesuvius plc announces that on 31 May 2013 following the satisfaction of all conditions to closing, it completed the sale of its Precious Metals Processing Division to Heimerle + Meule GmbH, a subsidiary of L. Possehl & Co, mbH.

The cash consideration of €56.8m was received on completion and will be subject to customary closing balance sheet adjustments.

As previously announced, the Company intends to undertake an on-market share repurchase programme to return up to £30m to shareholders. This programme is expected to commence post the 2013 AGM which will be held on Tuesday 4 June 2013 and to take up to 6 months to complete.

The balance of the net proceeds will be used to reduce the Company's existing borrowings.

StockMarketWire.com
Vesuvius Plc booked a first-half pretax profit of £64 million, down from £71 million a year ago. Revenue was £773 million, from £819 million. It proposed an interim dividend of 4.75p a share.

"Vesuvius has delivered a solid performance in the first half, in a trading environment that was generally stable but still operating at a substantially lower level than in the first half of last year," said CEO Francois Wanecq in a statement.

"All of our businesses performed better than, or in-line with, their main end-markets," he said.

He said trading margins recovered somewhat following the substantial falls in the second half of last year, although they werer still below the levels achieved during the same period last year.

MARKET REPORT: Vesuvius surprises dealers with maiden profits eruption

By Geoff Foster

PUBLISHED: 22:30, 2 August 2013 | UPDATED: 22:30, 2 August 2013

The maker of ceramic moulds for steel-makers and foundries, which was formed when Cookson split into two companies, certainly surprised Harry Philips, respected engineering guru at Oriel Securities.


He said: ‘It’s not often we can be described as being on the overly conservative side on numbers but on this occasion we are. Vesuvius has thumped our expectation out of the park with £71million of operating profit playing our forecast of £58million. Debt is also much better than we thought at £273million.’



MARKET REPORT: Vesuvius enjoys maiden profits eruption

Buyers responded to the impressive performance by piling into the shares which raced ahead to touch 507p before closing 40p or 9 per cent higher at 480p.


They have now risen 51 per cent since the de-merger in December.


Philips had been expecting a small decline in profits from the second-half of 2012 after the company said in March that trading was broadly similar to the latter half of last year.


Clearly, restructuring at Vesuvius is paying off. It sold its precious metals processing business, which recycles and provides semi-finished gold, silver and platinum to the jewellery industry, for €56.8million last month. It also said cheerio to its loss-making solar crucibles business late last year.
Chemicals group Alent, the other half of the Cookson demerger, closed 6p up at 377p.


Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/markets/article-2383823/MARKET-REPORT-Vesuvius-surprises-dealers-maiden-profits-eruption.html#ixzz2atIYyr7A
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Vesuvius: JP Morgan raises target price from 420p to 497p reiterating an overweight rating; Exane moves target price from 410p to 455p and keeps a neutral rating; Deutsche Bank takes target price from 350p to 450p, while its hold recommendation remains unchanged.

StockMarketWire.com
Analysts at Investec have effectively double-downgraded their recommendation on Vesuvius (LON:VSVS) and moved straight to "sell" (from buy) on valuation grounds, after the shares skyrocketed on the back of last week's positive set of interims. The City broker has upped its price target to 430 pence per share (previously 385 pence). The broker said: "The shares had already started running strongly before last Friday's results and they rose a further 40p (9%) on the day. Although we expect further progress from the company, we see this as an over-reaction and we switch to a Sell recommendation on valuation grounds.⬝ On Monday, JP Morgan Cazenove reaffirmed its "overweight" rating, increasing its price target to 497 pence a share (from 420 pence), whereas Deutsche Bank stuck with its less positive "hold" call and increased its target to 450 pence (previously 350 pence).

Ex divi wed 28th aug (4.75p)

StockMarketWire.com
Investec has upgraded its recommendation on engineering services group Vesuvius (LON:VSVS) to "hold" from "sell", on valuation grounds, believing the shares are currently trading at a more realistic level following the recent fall. The shares have pulled back by around 6 per cent in the past month. The broker has also trimmed its price target by 5 pence to 450 pence per share to reflect the slight sector de-rating. In our view, the price had spiked up too far and it has now returned to a level consistent with its margins, growth potential and capacity for dividend payment and growth" analyst Michael Blogg said in his note to clients.

StockMarketWire.com
Metal processing group Vesuvius said its trading performance in the period since 1st July has been in line with management's expectations.

Underlying market conditions reflected a continuation of the activity levels seen in the second quarter and were generally stable.

The company said it continues to successfully implement a number of actions to mitigate the effect of the weakness in end-market demand experienced since the third quarter of 2012, including a programme to streamline the Group's portfolio and focus on higher-value product lines. These self-help measures are contributing to an improvement in the Group's trading margins. Expectations for full year performance therefore remain unchanged.

STEEL
Regional steel production trends continue to be mixed. Global volumes as reported by the World Steel Association are 4.7% higher than the third quarter of last year, with continued weakness in Europe and a flat market in North America offset by growth in the Middle East and China. As expected, steel production volumes were lower than in the second quarter of this year, reflecting the normal seasonality resulting from customer shutdowns over July and August. The steel division's performance reflects these trends with recent trading activity being above the corresponding period of last year but below the second quarter of this year.

FOUNDRY
Despite some improvement in the truck and light vehicle markets, the weakness of the global mining and North American railroad sectors has prevented an overall recovery in the foundry casting market to date. Therefore, whilst the business environment remains challenging and recent trading activity has been marginally below the corresponding period of last year, we have mitigated these effects with the on-going focus on operational efficiency and the active management of our cost base.

FINANCIAL CONDITION
There has been no material change in the financial position from that reported at the half year results on 2 August 2013.

The share repurchase programme initiated on 4 June 2013 was completed in mid-September, with £30m of the proceeds of the sale of the Precious Metals Processing division having been returned to shareholders. The remainder of the proceeds were applied to the reduction of the Group's net borrowings. These actions underline the Group's commitment to exercise prudent capital discipline and offer attractive returns to shareholders.

Vesuvius plc announces the issuance of US$60 million and €30 million of US Private Placement loan notes ("the Notes").

Proceeds from the issue were received on 3 December 2013 and used to reduce drawings under the Group's existing committed bank facilities. The Notes, which all carry a fixed rate of interest, were issued in four series: €15 million at 3.46% maturing in December 2021, US$30 million at 4.61% maturing in December 2023, €15 million at 3.93% maturing in December 2025 and US$30 million at 4.96% maturing in December 2028. The weighted average interest rate and maturity on the Notes will be 4.34% and 11.5 years respectively.

This placement further strengthens the Group's balance sheet by diversifying its sources of funding and lengthening its debt maturities.

StockMarketWire.com
Vesuvius's FY pretax profit surged to £104.1m, from a restated £17.2m. Revenue was £1.51bn, from £1.55bn. It recommended a final dividend of 10.25p a share.

Vesuvius warned on the strength of sterling this year and its potential impact on financial performance.

CEO François Wanecq said in its first complete year as an independent company, Vesuvius had successfully initiated the recovery of margins across despite an unfavourable economic environment.

"Market conditions remained challenging in 2013, continuing from the reduced levels of activity seen in the second half of 2012, and Sterling strengthened substantially in the second half of 2013, impacting our reported growth numbers," he said.

Against this backdrop, Vesuvius had taken a disciplined approach to implementing its stated strategy.

"We streamlined our business portfolio and activities, exiting non-core low-margin businesses, further improved the quality of our products and services, and implemented self-help measures to increase the productivity of our own businesses," he said.

"The result is improved profitability, strong cash flow, and a more focused Group. This gives us a strong platform from which to pursue our growth strategy."

Looking ahead, Vesuvius expected the underlying trading environment during 2014 to be broadly similar to that experienced in 2013.

"We are progressing with our plan to improve operational efficiency across the group. These actions should continue to drive improvement in our trading margins and working capital performance in 2014."

However, if the recent strength of sterling continued it would have a negative impact on Vesuvius's reported growth in 2014.

Ex-divi wed 23rd Apr (10.25p)

StockMarketWire.com
Vesuvius said whilst there have been encouraging signs of increased activity in some end-markets, namely in Europe, conditions in other end markets remain challenging.

It therefore continued to expect the underlying trading environment during 2014 to be broadly similar to that experienced in 2013.

"As previously disclosed, a continuation of the current strength of sterling will have a negative impact on our reported results," Vesuvius said.
"Despite this, management's sustained focus on self-help measures to drive operational efficiency, coupled with the strength of our customer relationships and our technical leadership and innovation, is expected to drive further margin improvement during the course of the year," it said.
"Consequently, the Board remains confident in their expectations for the full year."

Vesuvius said there had been no material change in its financial position from that reported at 31 December 2013.

"We continue to operate with a strong balance sheet and remain cash generative. We are maintaining our focus on working capital management, and are making further progress in reducing inventory days across the Group."

StockMarketWire.com
Numis has upgraded its recommendation on Vesuvius (LON:VSVS) to 'add' from 'hold' after stating that it believes the stock is cyclicality overly discounted. The broker also added that the combination of the stock's current valuation, solid trading environment, margin upside and improving cash flow suggests a sensible entry point for investors. Analysts have set a new and improved target price of 515 pence per share.

StockMarketWire.com
Vesuvius's trading performance for the third quarter of this year has been in line with the Board's expectations, despite some softening in market conditions in certain regions since the announcement of our 2014 Half Year Results in August.

"Therefore, the Board's expectations for the full year performance remain unchanged," the company said in a statement.

"We continue to implement a range of strategic and operational initiatives across all business lines to improve trading margins across the Group, and we remain resolutely focused on cash generation.

"Further to the announcement made in August, we are pleased to announce the completion of the acquisitions of the technical services businesses, Ecil Met Tec and Process Metrix, for an aggregate consideration of approximately £30m."

Looking at its markets, Vesuvius added:

"Whilst there have been signs of increased activity in some end-markets, namely in the US, Europe has seen weaker growth over the period and conditions in end markets in South America and Asia remain challenging.

"We expect these conditions to continue for the remainder of the year. As previously disclosed, a continuation of the current strength of sterling will have a negative impact on our reported results.

"It is expected that Management's sustained focus on driving operational efficiency, coupled with the strength of our customer relationships and our technical leadership and innovation, will drive further margin improvement. Consequently, the Board's expectations for the Group's full year performance remain unchanged."

StockMarketWire.com
Vesuvius said in the course of the past month it made a preliminary proposal to the Board of Morgan Advanced Materials for an all-share merger between the two companies.

"The proposal was rejected by the Board of Morgan without discussions taking place. As a result Vesuvius confirms that it does not now intend to make an offer for Morgan," Vesuvius said in a statement.

The Board of Vesuvius (the "Board") believes that a combination of the two companies would have created a higher margin global leader in advanced ceramics technology, with complementary business models, strategies and cultures, delivering value-enhancing products and technical services to a broad range of end-markets.

StockMarketWire.com
Vesuvius has noted the announcements made by Alent and Platform Speciality Products Corporation regarding the resolution of litigation arising out of corporate activity relating to Cookson Group plc's performance materials division (now Alent) dating back to autumn 2006.

The pending litigation was noted in the contingent liability note of Vesuvius' 2013 Annual Report and Accounts.

Under the terms of the demerger of Vesuvius and Alent, Vesuvius is required to contribute 50% of any net settlement liability.

Vesuvius will pay US$10m (GBP£6.4m) as its share of the full and final settlement of the litigation.