Liquid Asphalt Producer Posts $14.5-Million Loss

Huntway Partners L.P., a Valencia-based producer of liquid asphalt, reported a fourth-quarter loss of $11.7 million, compared with a year-earlier loss of $1.62 million.

Huntway’s latest loss in the quarter that ended Dec. 31 came despite a 39% increase in its revenue, to $33.6 million from $24.2 million. Huntway blamed the worsening loss on the volatile price of crude oil after Iraq’s August invasion of Kuwait, which hurt Huntway’s profit margins.

Liquid asphalt is refined from crude oil, whose prices soared immediately after the invasion and then plummeted in late 1990 after U.S.-led forces began preparing to oust Iraq from Kuwait.

“Refining margins industrywide were extremely poor during the fourth quarter when petroleum product prices plunged from the highs in October,” Doug Hansen, Huntway’s chief financial officer, said in a statement.

For all of 1990, Huntway lost $14.5 million compared with a loss of $1.78 million the previous year. Its annual revenue climbed 34%, to $119.6 million from $89.5 million.