“Difficult market environment” for Wienerberger

The world’s largest brick manufacturer Wienerberger achieved significantly lower sales and profits in the first half of the year: Compared to the previous year, profits fell from 320 million to 223 million euros, the company announced on Thursday. However, the Ebitda margin has remained stable at around 20 percent.

Demand is weakening in all operational end markets. The development of new buildings in Central and Eastern Europe is going down drastically – in Poland and Hungary with declines of more than 40 percent. Despite these conditions, Wienerberger’s outlook for the year as a whole remains the same: the building materials group expects an operating EBITDA of between EUR 800 and 820 million.

At the end of June 2023, equity (including non-controlling interests) was just under EUR 2.6 billion and net financial debt was EUR 1.5 billion. The level of debt is 56.7 percent. The workforce was increased slightly: around 195 employees were added worldwide, the brick manufacturer has a total of 19,195 employees.