American Forest & Paper Association Releases August 2020 Containerboard Monthly Report

Following the successful launch of the Draft Latte, a distinctive crafted coffee drink using Crown’s InnoValve technology, La Colombe Coffee Roasters and CROWN Beverage Packaging North America, a business unit of Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: CCK) (Crown) (www.crowncork.com), have partnered again to bring another unique experience to coffee lovers everywhere. The MiniVault, a pre-portioned single-use can, delivers café quality ground coffee to consumers in a vessel that is both convenient for at-home use and extends the shelf life up to five times.

Peter Oswald, MM CEO, comments: “The MM Group recorded a decline in both Group sales and adjusted operating profit in the 1st quarter of 2024 compared to the previous year’s value, due to the earnings performance in the Board & Paper division. The destocking in the supply chain has been largely completed, leading to a significant recovery of volumes sold in Board & Paper. However, pressure on margins continued as expected, as price increases will only compensate for the recent rise in production costs from the 2nd quarter onwards. In contrast, the Packaging division recorded a slight increase in results compared to the previous year, even though the margin was below the strong level of the 3rd and 4th quarter of 2023. Against this background, the profit & cash protection programme, which has already been successfully implemented, and the measures to intensify market penetration will be systematically continued in 2024.

Total Containerboard production in December increased three percent compared to December 2019. It was up four percent when compared to the same 12 months of 2019. December 2020 production of containerboard for export decreased 22 percent compared to the same month last year; it was up nine percent year-to-date. The containerboard operating rate was 93.7 percent, essentially flat (-0.1 pts.) from December 2019 and up 2.3 points year-to-date. Mill inventories of containerboard at the end of December increased 3,000 short tons from the previous month and were up 3,000 short tons compared to December 2019.