Wacker Chemie continued to grow its business volume during the second quarter of 2012 thanks to good customer demand outside Europe. Sales and earnings at the Munich-based chemical company were both higher than in Q1 2012.

Wacker was, however, unable to match the strong second-quarter figures of a year earlier. The Group generated sales of €1,222.5 million from April through June 2012, up 2% on Q1 2012 (€1,194.3 million) and 8% below the prior-year level (€1,325.8 million).

Favorable exchange-rate effects arising from a stronger US dollar helped lift the Group's sales in the quarter under review. Sales trends were dam-pened by significantly lower prices, especially in the solar-silicon and semiconductor-wafer businesses. Overall volumes were also slightly down from a year ago.

Capacity at Wacker's production facilities was utilized at higher rates in the second quarter of 2012 than during the first three months of the year. This has improved coverage of fixed costs and helped generate higher earnings for the Group compared with the first quarter. However, the substantial reduction in polysilicon prices was the main reason that the Q2 2011 earnings figures could not be matched in the quarter under review.

In the period from April to June 2012, Wacker achieved earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) of €240.5 million (Q2 2011: €324.8 million) - thus down 26% on the strong prior-year period. But when compared with Q1 2012 (€211.8 million), EBITDA actually improved by 14%.

The EBITDA margin for the second quarter of 2012 was 19.7%, compared with 17.7% in the preceding quarter and 24.5% a year ago. The EBITDA reported for the quarter under review contains €19.4 million in advance payments that WACKER retained due to the termination of polysilicon supply agreements.

Net income for the period amounted to €60.6 million (Q2 2011: €142.7 million), which corresponds to earnings per share of €1.18 (Q2 2011: €2.87).

For the rest of the year, Wacker anticipates a general economic environment that will be challenging and marked by uncertainty and does not expect to reach its previous full-year sales projection of approximately €5 billion.

2012 sales for the Group are now expected to come in slightly below the figure reported for fiscal 2011 (€4.9 billion). EBITDA for fiscal 2012 is still likely to fall well short of the previous year's figure of €1.1 billion.