Valvoline
According to parent company Ashland, Valvoline posted operating income of $65 million for the three months ending Dec. 31 (the first quarter of Ashlands fiscal year), down 3 percent from $67 million in the year-earlier period. Valvolines sales reached $440 million for the quarter, up 10 percent from $400 million in the year-ago quarter.
Total lubricant volume reached 40.4 million gallons for the quarter, virtually unchanged from the year-ago period.
Ashland Chairman and CEO James OBrien said the company generated solid results for the quarter in the face of continued escalation in its raw material costs. Although the quarter ending in December is its seasonally weakest quarter, OBrien pointed out, Ashland achieved higher margins compared to the quarter ending Sept. 30 as a result of its ongoing pricing actions.
Each of our commercial units continues to implement price increases, with the largest sequential gains achieved by Ashland Consumer Markets [Valvoline] and Ashland Aqualon Functional Ingredients, said OBrien. Our success in the short term is directly related to our ability to pass through necessary pricing to offset these escalating costs.
Covington, Ky.-based Ashland as a whole reported operating income of $99 million, on revenues of $1.4 billion.
SK Lubricants
SK Lubricants posted 75.5 billion South Korean won (U.S. $67.3 million) in operating profit for the quarter ending Dec. 31, 2010, up nearly 41 percent from the year-earlier period. Sales for SK Lubricants topped 534.5 billion won, up 26.8 percent from 421.7 billion won in 2009’s fourth quarter.
For the full fiscal year, SK Lubricants posted 298.6 billion won in operating income on revenues of more than 2 trillion won.
SK operates a 21,000 barrel per day base oil refinery in Ulsan, South Korea, with API Group II and II production. The SK-Pertamina joint venture plant in Dumai, Indonesia, which is 65 percent owned by SK, has about 7,000 b/d of Group III capacity.