MOSCOW (MRC) -- Celanese Corporation, a global chemical and specialty materials company, has announced that its board of directors has approved a new USD1.5 billion share repurchase authorization, as per the company's press release.
The new share repurchase authorization represents approximately 11 percent of the company's shares outstanding.
The company deployed USD200 million to repurchase shares in the first quarter of 2019 under the previous USD1.5 billion share repurchase authorization put in place in 2017. As of March 31, 2019, approximately USD500 million remained on the existing share repurchase authorization which, combined with this new USD1.5 billion authorization, will support share repurchases over the next few years.
"Consistent share repurchases remain an important component of our balanced capital allocation strategy, and we will continue to opportunistically repurchase shares with remaining available free cash flow after dividends, organic investment and value-enhancing M&A. We will share additional detail on our capital allocation strategy as part of our first quarter 2019 earnings," said Mark Rohr, chairman and chief executive officer.
As MRC wrote previously, Celanese Corporation has increased list and off-list selling prices for Vinyl Acetate Monomer (VAM) sold in Europe, Turkey, the Middle East, Africa and the Americas. The price increases below is effective 1 April, 2018, or as contracts otherwise allow, and are incremental to any previously announced increases. Thus, VAM prices rose, as follows:
- by EUR100/mt - for Europe;
- by USD150/mt - for Turkey, Middle East and Africa;
- by USD0.05/lb - for USA and Canada;
- by USD150/mt - for Mexico and South America.
Celanese Corporation is a global technology leader in the production of differentiated chemistry solutions and specialty materials used in most major industries and consumer applications. Based in Dallas, Celanese employs approximately 7,700employees worldwide and had 2018 net sales of USD7.2 billion.
MRC