South32¡¯s Full-Year Earnings Jump 41% on Aluminum, Alumina

South32 Ltd., the miner spun out of BHP Billiton Ltd. in May, said full-year earnings rose 41 percent helped by its

aluminum and alumina operations.

Underlying earnings were $575 million in the year ended June 30, compared to a proforma $407 million a year earlier,

the Perth-based miner said Monday in a statement.

South32, the world’s biggest manganese ore producer, had record output of alumina in Brazil, metallurgical coal and

manganese alloy in Australia and manganese ore from South Africa. A cost-cutting program also boosted earnings, it

said.

The company will seek to reduce costs by at least $350 million a year for the next three years, and is continuing a

review of South Africa manganese operations that may lead to a further reduction in planned production, it said.

“Cost cutting and asset sales are likely,” Evan Lucas, a market strategist at IG Ltd. in Melbourne, said by phone.

“There’s got to be questions about manganese assets and what they are going to do with them.”

The producer declined 3.6 percent to $1.465 at 10:30 a.m. in Sydney, to the lowest since it began trading in May.

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