Linde: first-quarter earnings up 11%

(CercleFinance.com) - Industrial gas and engineering company Linde posted a rise in furst-quarter earnings, thanks to higher prices, but said that it has started to feel the impact of the global coronavirus crisis.


First-quarter adjusted operating profit was 1.35 billion dollars, up 11% or 14% when excluding unfavourable currency factors, the UK-based group said in a statement on Thursday.

Linde's first-quarter sales reached 6.7 billion dollars, up 1% year-on-year excluding negative currency translation and cost pass-through.

Prices increased by 2%, the company said, but volumes declined by 1%, mainly due to the impact of the Covi-19 pandemic.

While it said that it was "very difficult" to predict the impact that the virus will have, Linde noted that it has begun 2020 with a "very robust" balance sheet, pointing out 10 billion dollars worth of contractually secured backlog.

The Frankfurt-listed share was, however, down 2.1% after these results.

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