Astarta Holding plans to boost beet processing capacity by 29% to 27 ths mt

Astarta Holding (WSE: AST PW) plans to increase the capacity of its sugar refineries by 28.6% to 27 ths mt of sugar beets per day in 2010/11 refining season via modernization of its Yareskiv, Globyno, Zhdaniv, Kobelyaky and Narkevych facilities. The underlying capex is not available yet, although the management noted that the company will use its own funds as well as long-term loans to finance the project. Ruslan Patlavskyy: Since based on our estimates, the company operated at 58% capacity utilization in 2009/10 season, we believe that the main reason for the company to modernize its facilities is further optimization of direct operating costs with capacity increase serving as an added benefit of the project.