After five years of losses, Capral , Australia’s leading manufacturer of aluminium extrusion products, may have turned a corner.

The combined impact of a rocketing Australian dollar and dismal residential construction markets have weighed on earnings in recent years, but Bell Potter’s Jonathan Snape says those factors have masked an underlying improvement in Capral’s operations, with break-even earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation now down 35 per cent to 40 per cent compared with 2009 levels.