How Spain’s top infra players fared in LatAm last year

Spain’s six largest infrastructure firms performed strongly in 2023 due to their international portfolios that include many projects in Latin America. 

ACS, Acciona, Ferrovial, FCC, Sacyr and OHLA posted combined earnings of 2.53bn euros (US$2.74bn) last year, while their project portfolios amounted 218bn euros at the end of the year.

ACS

ACS had the biggest portfolio of projects, worth 73.5bn euros, up 6.6% from a year earlier. 

The company’s net income rose 16.7% last year to 780mn euros. 

Sales reached 35.7bn euros, up 6.3%, with North America representing 62% of the total. ACS did not disclose how much Latin America represented of sales. 

ACS’s projects in Latin America include the following:

Lima metro line No. 2 (Peru. US$5.35bn. Under construction)
Mining exploitation services at El Llano copper project (Chile. US$104mn. Through its subsidiary Thiess)
Santiago metro line No. 7 (Chile. US$2.5bn. Civil works on two tunnel sections)

Acciona

Acciona’s portfolio totaled 24.5bn euros at the end of 2023, up 11.3%. Latin America represented 27% and was the second largest region after Australia and Southeast Asia.

Net income rose 22.6% to 541mn euros, while sales jumped 52% to 17bn euros.

Acciona highlighted that last year it was awarded new contracts worth 9.41bn euros, while contracts worth 4.59bn euros were awaiting awarding decisions and contract signatures.

The group’s projects in Latin America include:

Sao Paulo metro line No. 6 (Brazil. US$2.3bn. Under construction)
La Serena hospital (Chile. US$234mn. Expected to start construction this year)
Los Merinos wastewater treatment plant (Ecuador. US$165mn. Under construction)
Las Sabanitas II potable water plant (Panama US$111mn. Under construction)
El Niño hospital (Panama. US$444mn. Under construction)
Panamericana highway, Puente de las Américas-Arraiján stretch (Panama. US$413mn. Under construction)
Cabo San Lucas desalination plant (Mexico. US$109mn. Under construction)

Ferrovial

The company, which last year moved its main headquarters to the Netherlands, did not provide a geographical breakdown of its portfolio, which rose 5.5% last year to 15.6bn euros.

Net income jumped 149% to 460mn euros, while sales were up 13.2% to 8.51bn euros.

Ferrovial attributed the positive numbers to increased traffic at highways and airports.

In Latin America it is currently involved in the following projects:

Ruta del Cacao highway (Colombia. US$761mn. Expected to wrap up works this year)
Ruta del Loa highway (Chile. US$300mn. Ongoing construction works)

FCC

The group’s portfolio of projects was worth 41.6bn euros at the end of last year, up 3.3%.

Net income jumped 87.5% to 591mn euros, with sales climbing to 9.03bn euros.

FCC highlighted that the Americas region (including the US) saw a 71.7% increase in revenues to 1.31bn euros in 2023.

Latin America contributed 91.4mn euros to FCC’s water business revenues, up 88.8% on the back of new concessions in Colombia and ongoing works in Mexico.

Projects being executed by FCC in the region include: 

Rioacha-La Guajira water network (Colombia. US$318mn. Operation and construction contract)
Maya train. Stretch 2 (Mexico. US$722mn. Under construction)
El Salitre wastewater plant expansion (Colombia. US$335mn. Under construction)
Lima metro line N°2 (Peru. US$5.35bn. Under construction and part of a consortium with ACS)

Sacyr

The projects portfolio advanced 7.17% and reached 55.4bn euros at end-2023, of which 47.3bn euros came from concessions.

Net income grew 38.6% to 153mn euros, while revenue fell 7.4% to 4.61bn euros. 

Out of Sacyr’s 70 concessions, 32 are in Latin America and include highways, airports and hospitals.

The LatAm portfolio includes the following projects:

Buin-Paine hospital (Chile. US$111mn. Under construction)
El Loa airport (Chile. US$100mn. In operation-construction)
Route 78 highway (Chile. US$892mn. In operation-construction)
Dique canal rehabilitation (Colombia. US$723mn. Under construction)
Pamplona-Cucuta highway (Colombia. US$861mn. Under construction)
Buga-Buenaventura highway (Colombia. US$512mn. Under construction)
Central railway (Uruguay. US$1.1bn. Under construction)

OHLA

After posting a 96.8mn-euro loss in 2022, OHLA reported 2023 net income of 5.5mn with revenues rising 27.1% to 3.59bn euros. 

The projects portfolio ended the year at 8.49bn euros, up 71%.

Latin America represented 23.3% of the contracts signed by the firm in 2023. The region also accounted for 19.6% of last year’s sales. 

Some of OHLA’s main projects in Latin America are:

National cancer institute (Chile. US$184mn. Construction is expected to begin next year)
Casma and Huarmey river defenses (Peru. US$130mn. Under construction)
Biobío hospital network (Chile. US$293mn. Works set to begin this year. Includes the Lota, Santa Bárbara, Coronel and Nacimiento hospitals)
Bogotá north access highway. Phase 2 (US$143mn. Awaiting environmental authorization)