Brazil’s diversified Paranapanema group announced yesterday that its re-capitalisation progamme will be completed by the end of August. It has also appointed Luiz Antonio de Souza Queiroz Ferraz Jr as CEO, replacing Geraldo Haenel, who is leaving the company. Mr Ferraz has been with Paranapanema for ten years and held the office of CFO since 2005.
There has been speculation for months that one of more divisions of the group will be sold off. Brazil’s Vale (formerly CVRD) said last month that it was evaluating two of the diversified group’s divisions – the Caraíba copper smelting business and and Cibrafértil fertilizers division. Vale was apparently not interested in the Taboca (tin) and Eluma (copper fabricated products) parts of the group.
In yesterday’s statement Paranapanema said that three of the four divisions have been “operating at full capacity with growing sales, increasing productivity and profitability gains”, while Taboca “is in a learning curve”. The tin division produced 2,743 tonnes of tin-in-concentrate in January-May, down 6.9% on the same period of 2008, although output should increase in the second half of this year as the expansion of ore treatment facilities at its Pitinga mine is completed.
