Russian aluminium producer United Company Rusal Plc posted a $3.2 billion loss for 2013, hurt by lower prices and restructuring charges, and said it was in still in talks to renegotiate part of its debt. The result, which included a $1.9 billion charge for impairment and one-off restructuring, compared with a $528 million loss in the previous year, the company said its results statement on Friday. Revenue fell 10.4 percent to $9.77 billion.
Aluminium prices are trading around their lowest levels in more than four years amid a global oversupply that has pushed stocks of the metal in London Metal Exchange (LME) warehouses to record levels.
Rusal's earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) fell to $101 million, from $221 million the previous year.
"EBITDA was a little below expectations, as the EBITDA margin contracted," said equities analyst Andrew Driscoll from CLSA.
Shares of Hong Kong-listed Rusal fell as much as 4 percent after the result before rebounding to be down 1.5 percent.
Rusal, which won a court ruling on Thursday derailing LME plans to cut logjams in warehouses, said the average LME aluminium price fell 8.6 percent in 2013 to $1,845 per tonne.
The company's aluminium output fell nearly 8 percent in 2013 to 3.857 million tonnes due to the curtailment of inefficient capacity.
Rusal, which has been in talks on restructuring its debt of about $10 billion, said it has completed restructuring negotiations with state lender Sberbank on $4.9 billion of debt and Gazprombank on $660 million.
It was in advanced talks on $3.7 billion of PXF facilities but expected to breach certain covenants, resulting in a default, as the talks were expected to continue past the expiry of a covenant holiday on March 31.
Rusal said in Friday's statement that the management believed the facilities would be renegotiated "in due course" and it should have sufficient liquidity to meet its obligations as they fall due.
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