AB InBev regains stake in aluminum can business

Belgium-based AB InBev, whose global brands include those in the American Anheuser-Busch portfolio, has announced it intends to exercise its right to reacquire a 49.9 percent stake in a network of United States aluminum can manufacturing plants it sold to New York-based Apollo Global Management Inc. in 2020.

When Apollo announced that purchase in 2020, it indicated it had paid approximately $3 billion for the Metal Container Corp. (MCC) plants over which AB InBev would retain operational control.

In announcing its reacquisition of the minority stake, AB InBev states, “Our U.S.-based metal container plant operations include seven facilities across six states and are a strategic component of our business, ensuring quality, cost efficiency, speed of innovation and supply security for our brands, while providing industry-leading manufacturing jobs and driving economic growth in communities across the U.S.“

A writeup on the United Kingdom-based TheDrinksBusiness website ties the move by InBev into a 50 percent tariff on inbound aluminum that has been enacted by the administration of U.S. president Donald J. Trump.

“From a drinks company perspective, the repurchase [will] assist AB InBev in securing packaging materials for canned beer products for the future and essentially help in reducing raw material and manufacturing costs for the company in the meantime,” writes Jessica Mason of the website.

To what extent AB InBev has an interest in operating one or melt shops to produce its own aluminum, rather than converting other companies’ aluminum into cans, is not mentioned in the brief January announcement announcing the repurchase by the global brewing company.