By Jaime Llinares Taboada

Kumba Iron Ore Ltd., the subsidiary of Anglo American PLC, on Tuesday posted an improved profit for 2020 driven by stronger prices and currency effects.

The South African iron-ore mining company made a pretax profit of 41.20 billion rand ($2.81 billion), up from ZAR29.25 billion in 2019.

Production declined during the period, but Kumba benefited from stronger iron ore prices and the depreciation of the rand against the dollar. As a result, its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization margin improved to 57% from 52%.

The company declared a final dividend of ZAR41.30, bringing the full-year payment to ZAR60.90, up from ZAR46.78 in 2019.

For 2021, Kumba guided for production of between 40 million and 41 million metric tons. This would be up from 37 million tons in 2020.

Anglo American said that it expects to report segmental underlying Ebitda for iron ore, including Kumba, of $2.7 billion.

Write to Jaime Llinares Taboada at jaime.llinares@wsj.com; @JaimeLlinaresT

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

02-23-21 0234ET