Viet Nam News -HÀ NỘI — Metal mining business Masan Resources, a member of consumer goods producer Masan Group, has recorded revenue of VNĐ806 billion (US$35.8 million) in the first quarter of the year.

The revenue is slightly lower than the same period last year as income from fluorite and copper sales declined on global exchanges, the company said in its financial statement.

Copper sales dropped 37 per cent year-on-year despite copper mining volume jumping 43 per cent and the fluorite sales decreasing by 7.2 per cent.

However, wolfram sales showed an improvement compared with the same period last year.

Wolfram sales rose 7.2 per cent to reach more than VNĐ450 billion, more than half of the company’s first-quarter revenue, as production increased by 10 per cent.

At the end of the first three months, Masan Resources earned a net profit of VNĐ11 billion, a big improvement from the loss of VNĐ89 billion incurred in last year’s first quarter.

The improvement was a result of the company successfully cutting costs incurred during the sale of goods and bringing down the cost of management by 34 per cent and 78 per cent, respectively.

In the first quarter of 2016, Masan Resources reported short-term debt was nearly VNĐ3 trillion and long-term debt was more than VNĐ8.1 trillion.

According to the quarterly report issued by Masan Resources, the market may see a rebalance sooner than expected as demand for the company’s products had risen since the beginning of April, bringing the price of wolfram to some $190 per tonne, at present.

Analysts also expect the recovery of wolfram price to extend in the future.

Masan Resources claims it is one of the leading mining and processing corporations in Việt Nam. The company operates the Núi Pháo Mine, the largest wolfram mine in the world, with a total capacity of 66 million tones.

The company has taken over 36 per cent of the world’s wolfram market share and aims to occupy 50 per cent of the global market by 2020.

This year, Masan Resources is targeting revenue of VNĐ4.5 trillion-VNĐ5.1 trillion and profit after tax of VNĐ220 billion-VNĐ660 billion.

Masan Resources also traded under the name MSR on the Unlisted Public Company (UPCoM) market in September 2015 with more than 703.5 million shares. MSR is currently at VNĐ16,900 per share. — VNS