Fauji Fertilizer temporarily shuts down Ghotki plant

Fauji Fertilizer Company Limited (FFC) on Monday announced that it has temporarily shut down its Mirpur Mathelo plant in Ghotki, Sindh.

In a notice to the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), FFC said this was due to a technical fault that occured at 23:05 PST on July 3.

Meanwhile, Topline Securities reported on social media that FFC’s Mirpur Mathelo plant III has been reportedly shut down due to an explosion caused by a gas leakage.

“To note, no casualty has been reported so far. We await further clarity to quantify the impact on company earnings,” it added.

Shuja Qureshi of JS Global was of the view that the development could be “slightly negative” for FFC’s stock price. The share price of FFC was being traded at Rs109.30 on Monday, a decline of Rs2.69 or 2.40%.

The Mirpur Mathelo plant has a capacity of 718,000 tons/annum, representing 35% of FFC’s total capacity.

As per FFC's financial results for the quarter ended March 31, 2022, the company achieved net profitability of Rs6.24 billion, translating into an EPS of Rs4.90. This was 7% higher than the corresponding period of the previous year.

FFC attained urea production of 635,000 tonnes and achieved benchmark sona urea offtake of 631,000 tonnes for the period. The company also recorded the highest ever income on deposits of Rs2.2 billion in addition to receiving its maiden dividend of Rs1.26 billion from FWEL I & II in a very short period since their acquisition.