James Hardie Class Action Investigation

What is the James Hardie Class Action Investigation about?

On 21 May 2025, James Hardie reported FY25 results and issued FY26 guidance forecasting organic sales and EBITDA growth across all regions.

However, on 20 August 2025, James Hardie released weaker-than-expected Q1 FY26 results and significantly downgraded full-year guidance. As compared to the first quarter of FY25, the results disclosed that: 

• net sales were down 9%
• adjusted EBITDA was down 21%
• adjusted net income was down 29%; and
• adjusted earnings per share (EPS) was down 28%.

James Hardie attributed the poor results to a range of factors, including customer ‘destocking’, channel inventory management, and soft market demand, particularly in its North American Fiber Cement segment.

Following this announcement, the James Hardie share price fell over 34% in two days (from $44.34 to $28.98), and financial analysts significantly cut their price targets.

Our investigation concerns whether James Hardie engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct and/or breached its continuous disclosure obligations by failing to disclose material issues affecting its North American Fiber Cement segment in contravention of the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) and the ASX Listing Rules, and in doing so failed, before 20 August 2025, to:

• correct market consensus regarding James Hardie’s expected Q1 FY26 results; and
• withdraw or correct James Hardie’s FY26 guidance.