Norsk Hydro Predicts Positive Future

Norway's Norsk Hydro has seen some positive signs in its aluminium products business and has no plans to cut production beyond what has been announced, its chief executive said on Thursday.
"There is a better balance between production and demand in our aluminium products business," chief executive Svein Richard Brandtzaeg told Reuters on the sidelines of an event marking Hydro's 100 years on the Oslo bourse. "We see some positive signs in that business," he said.
The company has cut or announced plans to cut by half a million tonnes of primary aluminium, equal to almost 30% of 2008 output, to adjust to weak demand in the global economic downturn.
"We have no plans to cut beyond what we have cut," Brandtzaeg said.
Hydro has two main divisions: the upstream business, which is the production of aluminium metal, and the downstream business, which involves producing semi-finished aluminium parts for industries such as auto-making and construction.
Those industries have been hit hard by the global economic crisis, reducing demand for aluminium parts and metal, along with many other basic materials.
"Generally in the aluminium market we have seen that the building of stocks has flattened out, meaning a better balance between supply and demand," said Brandtzaeg who took over as CEO from Eivind Reiten on 30 March.
"The production cuts have started to have an impact, but there is still overproduction around the world," he said. "On the positive side, China is managing to keep the balance better than feared."
Brandtzaeg referred to his recent estimate that the aluminium industry would need to cut a further 1.5 million to two million tonnes to avoid stock building. "It is difficult to say (how much is needed today). Overcapacity is on the way down, but it is still too much," he said.
Norsk Hydro shares traded up 0.5% at 28.90 crowns by 08.18GMT, lagging a 0.7% rise in the Oslo bourse benchmark index and a 1% rise in the DJ Stoxx Basic Resources index, of which Hydro is a component