Ecopro (086520.KQ) sustained its profitable operations in the first quarter, lifted by a recovery in downstream industries including semiconductors and electric vehicles.
Ecopro reported first-quarter consolidated revenue of 822 billion won ($600 million) and operating profit of 60.2 billion won ($44 million), the company said Tuesday. Revenue rose approximately 2% from a year earlier, while operating profit surged 42-fold.
The consolidation of its Indonesian smelter's results and rising metal prices drove the earnings improvement. The average price of lithium hydroxide, a key raw material for cathode materials, rose approximately 80% from $10.3 per kilogram in the fourth quarter of last year to $18.5 in the first quarter of this year, contributing to improved product selling prices.
Ecopro BM, which produces cathode materials, posted first-quarter consolidated revenue of 605.4 billion won and operating profit of 20.9 billion won. Revenue slightly declined from a year earlier, but operating profit rose significantly compared with 2.3 billion won in the first quarter of last year. Increased cathode material supply for European electric vehicles and higher sales of cathode materials for energy storage systems (ESS), driven by the expansion of artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, were key factors.
Ecopro Materials, which manufactures precursors, posted first-quarter revenue of 166.5 billion won and operating profit of 15.7 billion won. Ecopro HN, which operates an eco-friendly materials business, recorded first-quarter revenue of 34.7 billion won and operating profit of 5 billion won.
"We maintained our profitable trend in the first quarter with balanced growth across all business segments," an Ecopro official said. "The pace of earnings improvement will gain momentum from the second quarter, when rising mineral prices will be fully reflected in product selling prices."
Ecopro is also accelerating its global expansion. In the second quarter, the company will begin full-scale mass production at its cathode material plant in Hungary to target local European customers. "Along with intensive process innovation to overcome the management crisis, our preemptive efforts to secure future growth drivers, such as the Indonesian smelting business, are bearing fruit," Ecopro CEO Song Ho-jun said.
