Omega-3 fish oil products producer Omega Protein on Wednesday reported a drop in revenue to USD 41.8 million (EUR 31.4 million) for the second quarter of 2013, compared to USD 47.5 million (EUR 35.7 million) in the 2Q of 2012.
The company attributes the decrease to a USD 7.9 million (EUR 5.9 million) drop in animal nutrition revenues, which reflected lower sales volumes of 14 percent for fishmeal and 66 percent for fish oil, partially offset by higher sales prices of 10 percent for fishmeal and 64 percent for fish oil.
Despite the revenue decline, Omega Protein reported 2Q gross profit of USD 13.3 million (EUR 9.99 million), up 14.4 percent from the 2Q of 2012. Net income also increased to USD 4 million (EUR 3 million) compared with USD 2.5 million (EUR 1.88 million) during the same time period last year.
“We are pleased with the company’s increased earnings in the second quarter as we continued to benefit from better animal nutrition sales prices which helped drive higher revenue per ton and consolidated gross margin expansion versus the comparable period last year,” said Bret Scholtes, president and CEO. “While 2013 fish catch to date had been below average, we are pleased to see fish oil yields rebound sharply from last year and return to more normal year-to-date levels.
“We believe we are still in the early stages of capitalizing on our human nutrition growth opportunities with second quarter segment revenue 47 percent higher than the second quarter last year. Our investments in human nutrition over the last three years provide us with more control over the manufacturing process, create avenues for organic growth, and allow us to better develop additional value-added products to expand consolidated margins in the long-term. To this point, today we announced an expansion of our dairy protein production facility, which is expected to double its capacity and expand our dairy product offerings.”
For the first half of the year, Omega Protein posted gross profit of USD 25.4 million (EUR 19 million) income of USD 6.8 million (EUR 5.1 million) and EBITDA of USD 21.8 million (16.38 million) — all increases compared to the same time period in 2012.
