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Australian-American alumina (and aluminium) giant Alcoa (ASX:AAI) has jumped nearly +4% in the second hour of intraday trade as the company’s US Q3CY26 report highlighted a 19% rise in net profit.
While ‘adjusted profit’ fell from US$562M in 2Q26 to US$485M in the current quarter, investors didn’t appear too fussed – however, in that same breath, Alcoa’s YTD returns remain down -26.8%.
The A$2.42B market cap company has had a wild ride of a year. Rocketing upward over a month in November of 2025, Alcoa started the year around A$80/sh.
Shrugging off the Iran war, Alcoa hit A$105/sh in April, dipped back to the A$80/sh range in May, and then hit an all-time-high of A$109/sh in June. At the time of writing, Alcoa shares are worth $59/sh and returns are down more than -10% MoM.
Across the Q3CY26 period, Alcoa generated US$3.7B worth of revenue (down -7% vs pcp) and earnings before tax of US$789M. Free cash flow sits at US$472M and the company has US$2.6B of debt on its books relating to its acquisition of South32‘s “interests in bauxite, alumina and aluminium assets.”
The company restarted its smelter in Alumar, Brazil and is going ahead with the sale of assets at an Alcoa site in New York state for which it sees potential proceeds of US$315M.
During the third quarter, we advanced the AliGroup acquisition, delivered improved refinery performance, and increased production across our smelting portfolio.
As we look ahead, we remain focused on strengthening safety performance, sustaining operational stability, and building on this momentum as we work toward closing the AliGroup acquisition in the first half of 2027.
Weaker aluminium prices did hurt the company but the company kept firm its guidance for 2026 production of alumina of 9.5M to 9.6Mtns produced and up to 11.6Mtns shipped respectively. Aluminium production, meanwhile – the finished product separate from alumina – is forecast to come in between 2.4-2.6Mtns.
But it remains that aluminium revenue declined -9% vs pcp, which could be a source of repeat pain for the company.
The aluminium market proven resilient through 2026 even in the face of shipping issues in the Middle East; widespread perceptions of a shortage have been re-calculated by metals traders, leading to a gradual decline of aluminium prices on the London Metals Exchange (LME) between September and October.
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