News Release Corporate Communication Bernd Gersdorff mail: [email protected] Fax: +49(0)5341-212302 Tel.: +49(0)5341-212300 Date: May 27, 2009 End of blocking period: start of the Executive Board Chairman's speech General Meeting of the Shareholders of SALZGITTER AG Steel and Technology on May 27, 2009 Town Hall of Braunschweig Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Leese Chairman of the Executive Board SALZGITTER AG - Check against delivery - Dear Shareholders, Ladies and Gentlemen, May I welcome you warmly to today's General Meeting of the Shareholders of Salzgitter AG in Braunschweig. In recent years it has been our pleasure to present and explain the new record figures of the financial year then ended and, at the same time, to announce the positive signals still emanating from the global steel market for the respective current financial year in antici- pation of another set of pleasing results. The question has always been: “Will we be able to go one better in the current financial year by improving on the already excellent profit generated in the last financial year?” Unfortunately, in my speech today I will not be able to give a repeat of the euphoric re- ports that I was able to make in recent General Meetings - because, as you know, the crisis in the international financial markets spread to Europe in the course of last year and, as from the fourth quarter of 2008 in particular, the order intake of almost all sectors of industry slumped swiftly and dramatically. For manufacturers of steel, this marked the end of the favorable seller’s market that had held steady in the years before. At this year's conference of the World Steel Association, held at the start of May 2007 in London, it was the consensus of opinion of all CEO's present that what especially prob- lematic about the situation is that the current crisis in the steel industry is not - as in the past - due to self-inflicted structural problems which could be solved by virtue of our own efforts. Following the lead of this brief introduction, my speech today is in two parts: a pleasing report on the financial year 2008 and critical news concerning the current financial year 2009. Ladies and Gentlemen, First of all, the good news about the financial year 2008. We remained firmly on the path to success. We have - lifted sales to a new record high, - kept pre-tax profit from industrial activities at a high level, - raised the equity of the Group again, - expanded our portfolio through acquisitions and financial participations and - ensured that we have made good headway with our ambitious investment program. The financial statements as at December 31, 2008, both of Salzgitter AG and of the Group were individually issued an unqualified opinion by the independent auditor which you selected. 2 / 17 We have put the Annual Report 2008 on our website. And the printed version is also available in the foyer. The 2008 report stands under the auspices of "Values” and “Corporate Values”: leader- ship, solidarity, reliability, strategy, solidity and sustainability. These values will be re- flected in my report. Ladies and Gentlemen, The main areas on which I will be focusing in my speech today are the development of the Group in the financial year 2008, our operating activities in the five divisions and our growth strategy which we have consistently pursued, including our financial participation in Aurubis, formerly known as Norddeutsche Affinerie and Europe's largest copper manu- facturer. Furthermore, I will take stock of what we have achieved in recent years: which is our starting point for mastering the crisis and, at the same time, our potential for the time af- terwards. Finally, I will go into detail on the impact of the financial crisis on the economy, the steel market and on the divisions of our Group. Another topic will be the performance of the Salzgitter share. To conclude, I will round up my report with explanations on items of the Agenda, as pre- scribed under the law. The year 2008 was another financial year which produced generally very satisfactory re- sults. Let us take a look at some of the most important key figures of the financial year 2008 in comparison to those of 2007. With consolidated sales of € 12.5 billion, we lifted the previous year's figure again by more than € 2 billion to a new record high, which is an increase of 23 %. And although we were not able to set a new record with our pre-tax profit of € 1 billion, another way above average result has nevertheless strengthened our financial base. The operating result in the fourth quarter of 2008 would have comfortably allowed us to achieve a pre-tax result for the financial year 2008 close to the previous year's figure of € 1.3 billion. However, the steep decline in the price of almost all rolled steel products seen in the fourth quarter necessitated write-downs totaling € 224 million on inventories, which meant that the Groups pre-tax result in this quarter was negative at € –10 million. Having made this brief comment on pre-tax profit, let me return to the result after tax for the financial year 2008 which came to € 680 million. 3 / 17 Although the domestic, and thus predominantly relevant income tax rate as far as we are concerned, was considerably lower than in the preceding years as from the year 2008, € 320 million in tax expenses is nonetheless a very high amount. Return on capital employed from industrial operations, i.e. without the effect of our net cash position, fell from 47 % in the year 2007 to 27 % over the course of the financial year 2008. This was, on the one hand, attributable to the price- and volume-induced in- crease in the considerable amount of capital deployed to raise sales and, on the other, to huge capital expenditure for our strategic projects which can only be expected to yield a contribution to the results in 2011 at the earliest. As against the financial year 2007, the core workforce has risen by 800 employees to a total of 23,915. The lion’s share of this increase was attributable to the 430 employees from the first-time consolidation of the Klöckner PET Group into the Technology Division as per April 1, 2008. There was also a series of first-time consolidations in the Steel and Trading divisions. Ladies and Gentlemen, Now let us turn to the sales and profit trends in our five divisions. First look at external sales: The Steel Division recorded a sharp increase in sales, boosted by high shipment vol- umes, only in the first half of 2008. The third quarter saw volumes stagnating and prices rising. In the fourth quarter, shipment volumes fell sharply and selling prices a little which meant that, for the year as a whole, there was a marginal increase in sales of 5 % to € 3 billion. In the Trading Division, we have to differentiate between domestic shipments and inter- national trading. Whereas domestic business activities, similar to the Steel Division, be- came increasingly difficult over the course of 2008, international trading succeeded in keeping shipment levels high throughout the whole year, above all through business in Africa and in the Middle East. With an increase of 28 %, Trading set a new record in shipments which came to more than € 5.5 billion. Despite a decline in sales in the precision tubes segment, the Tubes Division lifted sales by 20 % to € 2.2 billion, first and foremost through full capacity utilization with good selling prices in the large-diameter tubes and stainless steel tubes segments and also owing to shipments of tube plate. Business of the Services Division with third parties climbed by 3 % to € 520 million. The sales increase in the Technology Division which came to 102 % is exclusively due to the fact that this division was only consolidated as from the second half of the year 2007. Total annual sales in both these years used for comparison remained at a constant level of around € 1 billion. I will return later to the notable increase in domestic sales, also shown on the chart, which documents the development of the divisions to form a synergistic group. 4 / 17 Ladies and Gentlemen, In the following annual comparison of pre-tax profit the downturn in the results of the Steel and Trading divisions in 2008 must naturally be interpreted in the light of the down- ward valuation adjustments made to inventories in December 2008. The Steel Division sustained a negative impact of more than € 100 million on its result owing to an amount of € 90 million in write-downs on inventories and the lower level of capacity utilization caused by slack demand in the second half of 2008. Accordingly, the pre-tax result declined by 27 % to roughly € 550 million in 2008, down from € 750 million in 2007. As the second-best pre-tax result to date, this still bears wit- ness to the division’s excellent performance in 2008. Excluding an amount of € 106 million in inventory write-downs, the Trading Division would have outperformed its record result of € 213 million achieved in the financial year 2007. Despite this 29 % decline in profit, the financial year 2008 was brought to a close with a still way above average pre-tax profit of € 150 million. The significantly lower increase in the pre-tax result as measured against the sales of the Tubes Division and which declined from € 303 million in 2007 to € 312 million in 2008 is due, on the one hand, to higher prices for purchasing input material and, on the other, to a downturn in the results of the precision tubes segment caused by the lower volume of shipments called by French and German automotive manufacturers.