Although the first months of the business year 2011/12 were characterized by positive demand and satisfactory results, after the summer, an economic cooling-off period set in, the result of widespread macroeconomic uncertainty. While, despite this trend, results for the voestalpine Group's four processing divisions (Special Steel, Railway Systems, Profilform, and Automotive) were largely stable, also during fall 2011, the situation in the Steel Division was significantly more difficult. From late summer 2011 on, severe consumer reticence led to lower capacity utilization throughout Europe and, in combination with significant declines in raw materials prices, led to sharply declining steel prices.
Although this made the third quarter of 2011/12 very difficult, during the first nine months, voestalpine Group was able to exceed the previous year's results, both for revenue and across all reporting categories.
With the turn of the year, the economic trend also reversed in the Steel Division and, with results simultaneously continuing to develop positively stable across the four processing divisions, earnings in the fourth quarter of the business year are expected to exceed those in the third quarter (although, however, it is not possible to achieve the results of the fourth quarter of the previous year). Thus, there is no change to the outlook from November 2011, i.e., for the business year 2011/12, we continue to anticipate a somewhat weaker operating result compared to the previous year (without taking any non-recurring effects from the railway infrastructure segment into consideration).

Key figures of voestalpine Group  

 * According to IFRS all results after Purchase Price Allocation (PPA)
** Before minority interest and hybrid capital interest

Additional information as well as the full report about the third quarter results of voestalpine AG as of the effective date of December 31, 2011 is available on our website www.voestalpine.com under the category "Investors.