BASF SE BASFY has signed an agreement to sell its Food and Health Performance Ingredients business, including the production site in Illertissen, Germany, to Louis Dreyfus Company (“LDC”). This is in sync with BASF’s portfolio optimization efforts and plans to diversify revenues through more value-added products and growth in downstream markets.

This segment of BASFY addresses the growing demand in human nutrition as it includes food performance ingredients such as aeration and whipping agents, food emulsifiers and fat powder grades; health ingredients such as plant sterols, esters, conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) and omega-3 oils. However, the business has limited synergies and integration into BASF and the company does not consider it to be a strategic focus area.

This divestment to LDC supports BASF’s strategic portfolio optimization and will help focus on its core businesses in Nutrition & Health. The company will concentrate more on vitamins, carotenoids and feed enzymes.

LDC, a leading global merchant and processor of agricultural goods, views this agreement as an opportunity to accelerate its participation in the rapidly growing plant-based ingredients market.

This transaction will include the transfer of approximately 300 employees from BASF to LDC, but the parties have agreed not to disclose the financial details of the transaction.

BASFY’s shares have plunged 17.7% in the past year compared with the industry’s decline of 13.1%.

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The BASF Group’s forecast for the 2024 business year published in the BASF Report 2023 also remains unchanged. The company expects EBITDA before special items of between €8.0 billion and €8.6 billion, free cash flow of between €0.1 billion and €0.6 billion and CO2 emissions of between 16.7 million metric tons and 17.7 million metric tons.

For the fourth quarter of 2024, there are risks from potential declines in prices and lower volume growth than expected. Opportunities may arise from a positive development in demand and margins.

BASFY’s Zacks Rank and Key Picks

BASFY currently carries a Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell).

Some better-ranked stocks in the Basic Materials space are Carpenter Technology Corporation CRS, CF Industries Holdings, Inc. CF and Ingevity Corporation NGVT. While CRS sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) at present, CF and NGVT each carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Carpenter Technology’s current-year earnings is pegged at $6.74 per share. CRS’ earnings beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate in three of the trailing four quarters and missed the last, with the average surprise being 14.1%. The company’s shares have gained 143% in the past year.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for CF Industries’ current year earnings is pegged at $6.36 per share. CF surpassed the Zacks Consensus Estimate twice in the trailing four quarters and missed the rest, with an average earnings surprise of 10.3%. The stock has gained 5.9% in the past year.

The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Ingevity's current-year earnings is pegged at $2.55 per share. NGVT beat the consensus estimate in three of the last four quarters while missing the mark in one, with the earnings surprise being 95.4%, on average.


 

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