Building materials group CRH has reported higher revenues and profits for 2018 on the back of strong demand for its products.
The company said its revenues for the year to the end of December rose by 6% to €26.790 billion, while its group profits jumped by 31% to €2.521 billion.
During the year, sales in Europe rose by 2%, while they were up by 4% in the Americas and by 8% in Asia.
CRH is North America's biggest producer of asphalt for highway construction and third biggest supplier of ready-mixed concrete and construction aggregates.
The company has recommended a total dividend of 72 cent for the year, an increase of 6% on 2017's dividend.
Its chief executive Albert Manifold said the company benefited from good demand and continued favourable market fundamentals in the Americas coupled with positive underlying momentum in Europe.
This came against a backdrop of energy-related input cost inflation and significant weather disruption during the year.
Looking ahead, CRH said that while Brexit has created a level of uncertainty, against an overall backdrop of increasing demand - especially in the residential sector - it expects progress in Europe to continue in 2019.
Supported by continued favourable market dynamics, CRH also said that it expects continued growth in the US housing construction and that non-residential construction will also show gains.
It said that federal funding for infrastructure in 2019 is expected to increase, while state fiscal conditions continue to improve. It also anticipates the overall market in Canada to be ahead this year.
"CRH remains well positioned to build upon the gains made in 2018. With a relentless focus on continuous business improvement, margin expansion, cash generation and returns for shareholders, together with continued strong financial discipline and efficient allocation of capital, we believe 2019 will be a year of progress and further growth for the group," the company's CEO said.
CRH, the world's second-biggest building materials supplier by market capitalisation, launched its first share buyback programme in a decade last year and will complete the repurchase of €1 billion of shares at the end of March.
After generating €2.4 billion in cash from its operations last year, CRH's chief financial officer Senan Murphy told Reuters it would "absolutely" consider more buybacks.
"We're generating a lot of cash and that gives us options. Assuming we get shareholder approval to continue to proceed, then we'll obviously look at further phases of buyback into the future," Senan Murphy said.
Big spending CRH held back on major acquisitions last year as it digested the $3.5 billion purchase of US cement maker Ash Grove agreed in 2017.
Chief executive Albert Manifold told Reuters his finger would remain on the "pause button" for the first half of this year - even though that still allowed it to spend more than €600m on 45 smaller deals throughout 2018 - and that it would look at larger options from the second half.
CRH also decided to streamline some of its European and American businesses under one division last year, at the same time as announcing a strategic review of its Europe Distribution unit.
Albert Manifold said the review was ongoing and would be completed within six months.
He described the €3.8 billion unit as a "fine business" that improved in the second half of last year and that the call would purely be a capital allocation decision.
CRH noted that Irish sales and operating profits in its "Europe Heavyside" division were ahead of 2017 mainly due to the continued market recovery, especially in the Dublin area.
It said that volumes increased and positive pricing trends were evident across key products, offsetting increased input costs, particularly energy.
Analysts at Davy Stockbrokers said CRH's "equally judicious capital allocation strategy in 2019" should benefit shareholders both in terms of dividend and buyback returns, as well as share price performance.
The group's shares have risen by 20% so far this year and were 2.1% higher in Dublin trade today.
Additional reporting by Glenda Sheridan
