CLEVELAND, Feb. 27, 2015 /PRNewswire/ — Aleris announced today that it has completed the sale of its Recycling and Specification Alloys businesses to an affiliate of Signature Group Holdings for an aggregate of $500 million in cash and $25 million in Signature preferred stock. The sale, which was announced in October, includes 18 production facilities in North America and six in Europe that offer a wide range of metal recycling services and specification alloy products.

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“The sale of the recycling and specification alloys businesses will allow us to place a stronger focus on aluminum rolled products, ensuring that we are poised to capture the benefit of strong projected growth in a variety of industries including automotive, aerospace, and U.S. building and construction,” Steve Demetriou, Aleris chairman and CEO said. “The recycling and specification alloy businesses are strong and profitable, and we wish Signature and all of our former employees great success in the future.”

The sale of the Recycling and Specification Alloys businesses represents a major step forward in the company’s transformation to a pure play rolled products company.

About Aleris
Aleris is a privately held, global leader in aluminum rolled products. Headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio, Aleris operates production facilities in North America, Europe and Asia. For more information, visit www.aleris.com.

Forward-Looking Statements

Certain statements contained in this press release are “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the federal securities laws. Statements about our beliefs and expectations and statements containing the words “may,” “could,” “would,” “should,” “will,” “believe,” “expect,” “anticipate,” “plan,” “estimate,” “target,” “project,” “look forward to,” “intend” and similar expressions intended to connote future events and circumstances constitute forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements include statements about, among other things, future costs and prices of commodities, production volume, industry trends, demand for our products and services, anticipated cost savings, anticipated benefits from acquisitions or divestitures or new products or facilities, and projected results of operations. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ materially from those contained in or implied by any forward-looking statement. Some of the important factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, the following: (1) our ability to successfully implement our business strategy; (2) the cyclical nature of the aluminum industry, material adverse changes in the aluminum industry or our end-use segments, such as global and regional supply and demand conditions for aluminum and aluminum products, and changes in our customers’ industries; (3) our ability to fulfill our substantial capital investment requirements; (4) variability in general economic conditions on a global or regional basis; (5) our ability to retain the services of certain members of our management; (6) our ability to enter into effective metal, natural gas and other commodity derivatives or arrangements with customers to manage effectively our exposure to commodity price fluctuations and changes in the pricing of metals, especially London Metal Exchange-based aluminum prices; (7) our internal controls over financial reporting and our disclosure controls and procedures may not prevent all possible errors that could occur; (8) increases in the cost of raw materials and energy; (9) the loss of order volume from any of our largest customers; (10) our ability to retain customers, a substantial number of whom do not have long-term contractual arrangements with us; (11) our ability to generate sufficient cash flows to fund our capital expenditure requirements and to meet our debt service obligations; (12) competitor pricing activity, competition of aluminum with alternative materials and the general impact of competition in the industry segments we serve; (13) risks of investing in and conducting operations on a global basis, including political, social, economic, currency and regulatory factors; (14) current environmental liabilities and the cost of compliance with and liabilities under health and safety laws; (15) labor relations (i.e., disruptions, strikes or work stoppages) and labor costs; (16) our levels of indebtedness and debt service obligations, including changes in our credit ratings, material increases in our cost of borrowing or the failure of financial institutions to fulfill their commitments to us under committed credit facilities; (17) our ability to access the credit and capital markets; (18) the possibility that we may incur additional indebtedness in the future; (19) limitations on operating our business as a result of covenant restrictions under our indebtedness and our ability to pay amounts due under the Senior Notes; (20) the possibility that we may not realize any anticipated benefits from the transactions contemplated by the purchase and sale agreement we entered into on October 17, 2014; (21) the transactions contemplated by the definitive agreement (including the possibility that the transactions may not close or that, if a transaction does close, Aleris may not realize the anticipated benefits from such transaction) we entered into on December 18, 2014; and (22) other factors discussed in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including the sections entitled “Risk Factors” contained therein. Investors, potential investors and other readers are urged to consider these factors carefully in evaluating the forward-looking statements and are cautioned not to place undue reliance on such forward-looking statements. We undertake no obligation to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether in response to new information, futures events or otherwise, except as otherwise required by law.

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SOURCE Aleris