Voestalpine Pins Hopes on Earnings Uptick While Kindberg Workforce Awaits Its Social Plan
Published on 11/11/2026 at 02:12 | Editorial boerse-global.de
Voestalpine's second-quarter report, scheduled for release on 11 November 2026, has become the focal point for investors weighing a projected earnings improvement against the mounting cost of US trade barriers on the group's seamless pipe business. The same date will also carry the company's report for the second quarter of fiscal 2026/27.
Consensus estimates point to earnings per share of EUR 0.584 for the quarter, up from EUR 0.550 a year earlier, on revenue of EUR 3.87 billion. The full-year picture is brighter still: analysts forecast EPS of EUR 3.63 against EUR 2.48 last year, with sales seen at EUR 15.76 billion. Whether those numbers hold depends heavily on how the company frames the drag from its American operations.
Tariff Stack Weighs on Kindberg
At the Kindberg site, the arithmetic is far less encouraging. US duties on seamless pipe total as much as 107.38%, a figure that combines the existing 50% steel tariff with provisional additional levies of 57.38%. The United States is Kindberg's most important sales market, and management has acknowledged that shipments of the affected pipe can only be delivered economically to a limited extent under the current burden. Voestalpine has said it intends to contest the tariff decision.
The consequences for the workforce are already taking shape. Roughly 150 jobs are to be eliminated at Kindberg by the end of March 2027. Works council representative Franz Jantscher has announced talks with management on a social plan and on possible placements elsewhere in the group, according to media reports. Those discussions would cover both severance protection for affected staff and employment prospects within the wider company. Redeployment to other sites is on the table as an option, though no commitment has been given. Morale at the plant is described as tense.
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The company has pointed to the US duties as well as difficult alternative markets in the Middle East as the reasons behind the production adjustment.
A Different Route Into America
Not every part of Voestalpine's US footprint faces the same conditions. At the end of July, the group opened its expanded plant in Jeffersonville, a EUR 70 million facility for truck components that created 110 jobs. Local manufacturing and Austrian pipe exports operate under entirely separate trade rules, which means a single verdict on the company's US exposure would be misleading.
For Kindberg, the decisive variable remains the final scope of the additional duties. Washington's rulings are expected by 12 January 2027 in the subsidy case and by 22 March 2027 in the anti-dumping proceeding.
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Apprentices and the Road Ahead
Elsewhere, Voestalpine is pressing on with training. Some 380 apprentices from Austria, Germany and Switzerland gathered in Linz on Thursday for the group's apprentice day, following the intake of 311 new trainees in Austria in the autumn.
Shares were up 1.0% on the day. No link between the stock movement and the reported job cuts has been established.
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