Evaluation of mining companies based on benchmarking

Managerial and investment decision quality is influenced, inter alia, by the availability of high-quality information. The sources of such information may be different analyses and studies, including company benchmarking. However, such analyses and studies often have in-company character, which makes access to some information on the national economy difficult. To deal with this problem in the mining sector, the article deals with benchmarking of 30 mining companies operating in the Czech Republic. Based on the size of mining, the first four companies in each group of minerals, or more precisely, a subgroup of minerals (hard coal, brown coal, oil, natural gas, brick raw material, building stone, decorative stone, gravel and sand, limestone, kaolin, clays and bentonite) were selected for the benchmarking project. Benchmarking was conducted for the period from 2011 to 2018 using six financial analysis indicators: ROA, inventory turnover, total debt, immediate liquidity, LTTA productivity, networking capital turnover. Individual benchmarks do not have the same weight, and weights were determined by AHP. The evaluation was done using a mathematical-statistical method of the weighted sum approach. The benchmarking showed that the top 3 mining companies are Cement Hranice, akciova spolecnost (1) - limestone; Green Gas DPB, a.s. (2) - energy raw materials (natural gas); and EUROVIA Kamenolomy, a.s. (3) - building materials (building stone). At the opposite end of the list there are: Cihelna Hodonin, s.r.o. (30) - building materials (brick-making material); Sedlecky kaolin, a.s. (29) - kaolin; and CEMEX Sand, k.s. (28) building materials (gravel and sand). Furthermore, it was found that: (i) the economic success of the mining undertaking is not related to the volume of production or indebtedness; (ii) limited liability companies are more economically successful than joint-stock companies. It has not been proven unequivocally that specialisation in a single extracted material is a better strategy than extracting more mineral resources.