Gypsum industry news

US: The Oxford Fire Department responded to a minor fire on 22 September 2015 at the National Gypsum Company in Oxford, Michigan.

A call first came in about a fire in the plant's paper bale room around 11:15am from an employee at the plant, according to Oxford fire chief Gary Sparks. Firefighters were on scene within three minutes of the call, extinguished the fire and left the scene by 12:40, said Sparks.

It is unclear how the fire started, but the sprinkler system held the flames in check until responders arrived on the scene. "There was minimal damage," said Sparks. "The majority of it was to the paper bales, but there was some smoke damage in the office area." There were no injuries reported during the incident and the plant was expected to be up and running before the day ended.

Russia: Knauf Gips has filed a lawsuit in the commercial court of Moscow against Prikamskaya Gypsum Company, Gipsopolimer (30.84% owned by Knauf), the Prikamskaya Gypsum Company trading house, the Erster trading house and GlavOptStroyTorg. Knauf Gips has demanded that the defendants be forbidden from using symbols similar to Knauf's trademarks and has claimed Euro61.1m. Knauf Gips has also demanded that counterfeit gypsum wallboard with its trademark be destroyed.

Oman: As the Omani national rail network currently under development connects mining sites with the Sultanate's maritime gateways, gypsum exports and other minerals will increase massively.

Oman Rail's general manager stressed that the switch from outdated truck-based shipping of minerals to rail-based freight, along with the deployment of high-capacity ship-loading systems, has the potential to send export volumes soaring. A 60,000t ship can take around 4 - 6 days to load using traditional transportation and loading techniques, so with the new system the goal is to advance that significantly by using high capacity methods of loading.

As the rail network becomes fully operational, the transportation capacity is expected to increase from an approximately 10 – 12Mt/yr to nearly 20Mt/yr.

Europe: USG has entered into a definitive agreement for the sale of its interest in Knauf-USG Verwaltungs GmbH and Knauf/USG Systems GmbH and Co KG to Knauf Aquapanel GmbH for approximately Euro48m in cash.

The Knauf-USG joint venture manufactures and distributes Aquapanel brand cement panels throughout Europe (excluding Turkey) and all countries that were part of the former Soviet Union.

USG's equity method income in the Knauf-USG joint venture amounted to Euro1.79m for the year that ended on 31 December 2014. Upon the close of the transaction, USG anticipates recording a Euro2.68 – 6.26m gain. The closing of the sale is subject to the receipt of necessary governmental approvals and other customary closing conditions and is expected to take place by the end of 2015.

US: Lone Star Funds has agreed to sell 4 million shares of common stock in Continental Building Products (CBP) through an underwritten secondary offering. Based on the closing price of CBP's common stock on 9 September 2015, the offering is valued at approximately US$85.2m. The underwriter has a 30-day option to purchase up to an additional 600,000 shares of common stock from the selling stockholder. Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC is acting as the underwriter for the offering, which is expected to close on 16 September 2015.