Weak dollar hurts Kvaerner IMGB

Romanian heavy equipment manufacturer Kvaerner IMGB posted $600,000 (480,000 euros) net profit last year under the international accounting standards. It had made the same profit the year before. The financial statements of the heavy equipment manufacturer drafted under the Romanian accounting standards (RAS) were affected by the ROL/USD exchange rate trend. “Under RAS we had a rather significant loss because of the rejuvenated ROL. We had to record a negative difference related to the capital increase last year and we practically registered a loss of 700 ROL for each of the 57 million dollars (a total of 40bn ROL, or 1.45 million dollars i.e.) our majority shareholder contributed,” explains Florin Antonescu, the company’s chief executive. IMGB is over 99% held by Norwegian Aker Kvaerner Group, which increased its capital by 57 million dollars (44 million euros) in 2004, after giving up on the idea to sell IMGB. ZF