[ferro-alloys.com]Nucor on Tuesday said it expects to report a loss in the second quarter of 2020 as it expects market conditions to hit bottom during the period amid the coronavirus pandemic.

While automotive and energy markets have seen the sharpest decline to date as a result of the coronavirus outbreak, non-residential construction – Nucor's largest end market – has shown resiliency through the pandemic, the company said.

Nucor's steel mill shipments totaled 6.5 million st in the first quarter, an increase of 8% compared with the year-ago quarter. Shipments of sheet steel products rose 9% year on year to 2.87 million st.

Overall, Nucor reported net income of $20.3 million on sales of $5.62 million in Q1, down from net income of $501.8 million on sales of $6.1 billion in Q1 2019.

Included in the most recent quarter's results are losses on assets of $287.8 million, related to the company's investment in Duferdofin Nucor in Italy. Nucor determined that a triggering event occurred in Q1 due to adverse developments in the joint venture's commercial outlook, which has been further influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic, all of which have negatively impacted the joint venture's strategic direction, it said. As a part of the losses on assets, Nucor recorded a non-cash impairment charge of $250 million in Q1.

The coronavirus pandemic continues to have a significant impact on Nucor, the company said, however its plants have been deemed essential and continue to operate.

"We are maintaining production operations sufficient to meet our customers' ongoing needs," Nucor said.

The company's direct reduced iron (DRI) facility in Trinidad stopped production March 30 to comply with that country's stay-at-home orders and remains offline. Nucor's Louisiana DRI plant also halted production April 2 in response to market conditions and health precautions, however operations resumed April 25, Nucor said.

The impact of the coronavirus has been varied across the markets Nucor serves, the steelmaker said, with automotive and energy demand taking the biggest immediate hit.

"Where we have seen impact on nonresidential construction activity, the sentiment is projects would be delayed rather than cancelled," the company said in its outlook. "It is also worth noting that there has been a fairly significant supply side response to the pandemic, with a number of our competitors having idled capacity in response to these challenging conditions."

Nucor said it believes the company's financial strength will help it weather the sudden economic downturn. At the end of Q1 the company had $1.39 billion in cash and short-term investments on hand and its $1.50 billion revolving credit facility remains undrawn and available, it said.

"We believe we continue to have access to the capital markets at a reasonable cost of funds," Nucor said.

In the meantime, the company has reviewed its capital expenditure budget for the year and has decided to freeze spending on certain capital projects currently in process and delay capital projects that have not begun. The company lowered its 2020 estimated capital expenditures to less than $1.5 billion, down from an initial projection of $2 billion in spending for 2020.

"While the economic outlook is highly uncertain at present, with the duration of the COVID-19-induced downturn difficult to predict, we currently believe that market conditions will bottom in the second quarter and Nucor will return to profitability in the second half of this year," the company said.

(S&P Global Platts)

• [Editor:王可]