Despite a persistently difficult market environment, Covestro rigorously continued its transformation in fiscal 2024. The company sold greater volumes worldwide due to targeted measures to increase plant availability. Sales fell by 1.4% to € 14.2 billion (previous year: € 14.4 billion) mainly due to low selling prices.

EBITDA remained stable, falling by 0.8% to € 1.1 billion (previous year: € 1.1 billion), and was thus within the expected range. Net income amounted to € –266 million (previous year: € –198 million), while the free operating cash flow (FOCF) reached € 89 million (previous year: € 232 million).

“We steadfastly adhered to our strategy in 2024 and forged full speed ahead with our transformation – despite the challenges the entire chemical industry once again faced,” says Dr. Markus Steilemann, CEO of Covestro. “In particular, the improvement in our plant availability enabled us to significantly increase our volumes sold. We are continuing resolutely along this path creating the basis for long-term growth with targeted investments in our competitiveness and sustainable future technologies.”

A key component of Covestro’s transformation is to strengthen production capacities. In 2024, the company optimized existing plans in Baytown (United States), Shanghai (China) and Tarragona (Spain), among others. Further investments to increase energy efficiency and thus competitiveness in production were also made at the TDI plant in Dormagen (Germany). Covestro also recently announced to expand its site in Hebron, Ohio (USA) with a low triple-digit million euro investment.

The company aims to increase the production capacities of differentiated polycarbonates in the Solutions & Specialties segment. Construction is scheduled to begin in 2025, with operations starting by the end of 2026.

“We cannot influence external market conditions – but we can control how we respond to them,” says Christian Baier, CFO of Covestro. “That is why we used 2024 to make our processes more efficient and to enhance our resilience.” Digitalization and artificial intelligence play a key role in that. We will continue to optimize our structures in 2025 to make Covestro fit for the future.”

Covestro expects economic conditions to remain challenging in 2025, too. Against this backdrop, the Group anticipates EBITDA of between € 1.0 billion and € 1.6 billion for the current fiscal year. Covestro expects FOCF of between € 0 and € 300 million.

The Group anticipates that Scope 1 and Scope 2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, measured in terms of CO 2 equivalents, at Covestro’s environmentally relevant sites 1 will be between 4.2 million metric tons and 4.8 million metric tons. The Group expects EBITDA for the first quarter of 2025 of between € 50 million and € 150 million.