Finnish company Ahlstrom has registered net sales of €774.4m ($842.7m) during the second quarter (Q2) of 2023, down by 10.6% from €866.4m a year ago.

The company said that this decline was due to higher selling prices and lower deliveries from destocking.

For the period, which ended on 30 June 2023, the company registered a negative net result of €9.1m, as against a positive net result of €20.7m in Q2 2022.

The operating result declined by 44% to €32.1m from €57.4m in Q2 last year. This decrease can be attributed to impairment loss relating to Ahlstrom’s Stenay plant in Meuse, France.

In July, the company received a binding offer from Germany’s Accursia Capital to sell its Stenay plant. The divestment of this facility in Stenay was finalised last week. 

The company’s earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) for the reported quarter totalled €82.6m, representing a decrease of 18.1% from €100.9m in Q2 2022.

Ahlstrom CEO and president Helen Mets said: “We are pleased with the sequential improvement in comparable EBITDA in the second quarter, despite lagging last year's record level.

“As expected, customer activity was low in the quarter due to continued destocking in most of our value chains and the weaker end markets. However, we managed to partially offset the effect of the low volumes by further improving the margin on variable costs per ton through our transformation initiatives.

“We have also intensified cost control across our businesses and continued with temporary capacity adjustments as needed.”

During the first half (H1) of 2023, net sales were down by 4.4% to €1.57bn, while the same was €1.64bn in previous year’s H1.

Ahlstrom reported negative net result of €23.4m, as against positive net result of €28.2m in Q2 2022.

Operating result in H1 2023 stood at €64.9m versus €88.1m during the same period of last year.

EBITDA in H1 2023 decreased by 8.8% to €159.1m from €174.6m in H1 2022.