Building materials group CRH is likely to hold back on major acquisition activity for the rest of 2018 as it digests last year's deals, CEO Albert Manifold said today.
CRH committed to €5 billion of deals last year, including the €3 billion purchase of Ash Grove Cement, which is due to close shortly.
The need for a pause to integrate the new businesses was one of the reasons CRH gave for opting instead to hand €1 billion back to shareholders in its first share buyback programme in a decade announced yesterday.
"If things go extremely well and extremely quickly (with the integration), I'd say you could be back there in the third quarter, fourth quarter... but I'd say pretty much for the remainder of this year," Manifold said after CRH's annual shareholder meeting, referring to the pause on major deals.
But he said smaller deals would still continue after CRH spent €150m on six such transactions in the first quarter.
"The bolt-ons just come through, you'll do between €500 and €1 billion this year," Manifold said, referring to the smaller firms CRH routinely purchases.
"But there will be no big stuff happening because all our focus and resources have to be focused on delivering that €5 billion," he said referring to the amount spent on deals last year.
