Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. Appoints New Chief Financial Officer

Iron-ore miner Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. has announced a new chief financial officer.

The company has landed the finance chief of metals service center Metals USA Holdings Corp., Keith Koci.

Koci will be succeeding Timothy Flanagan, who is leaving the mining company after two years of being CFO. The move is effective immediately.

Koci had held his role at Metals USA Holdings since 2013 and joined the company in 1998.

Cleveland-Cliffs’ chairman and chief executive. Mr. C. L. Goncalves remarked, “During the ten-year period we worked together at Metals USA, Keith was my key player in the execution of several strategic acquisitions, each one with a different level of financial complexity.”

Mr. Goncalves had served as chairman, president and CEO of Metals USA between May 2006 until April 2013.

“We accomplished many great things with Tim serving as an important part of the team, and I wish him the very best,” Mr. Goncalves also said. Mr. Flanagan is leaving the company after roughly a decade at the company.

Recently the company reported fourth quarter financial results, revealing net income of $609.5 million, or $1.98 a share. Analysts had been expecting $184 million in profit, or 59 cents a share. Earnings from continuing operations was $2.03 a share.

“We concluded in 2018 with a fourth quarter adjusted EBITDA of $188 million. This equated to adjusted EBITDA of $766 million for the full year, our highest market in 4 years. Our 2018 EBITDA represented a 67% increase from the prior year and more than tripled what we reported 2 years ago”

Looking ahead, Mr. Flanagan remarked, “Based on iron ore prices as of this morning, our revenue expectation is now a range of $113 to $118 per long ton. Compared to with what was published in our press release this morning, these ranges are $11 higher than the January average and $2 higher than yesterday’s indicative range. As we always note, the figures that we have utilized do not reflect our internal view on pricing, they just represent points in time in the market.” He added, “While the seasonality of our business should be well understood by now, I want to highlight to any new analyst and investor that our first quarter is always extremely light in both tonnage and price due to the annual closure of the Soo Locks limiting shipment on the Great Lakes and forcing us to limit our deliveries to rail only. As for the divestiture of the APIO business and the adoption of the new revenue recognition standards last year, Q1 numbers became even less relevant as they now represent less than 5% of the full year expected revenues.”