Top story:
Unilever will separate its ice cream division through a demerger by listing the business in Amsterdam, London and New York.
The owner of brands like Magnum and Ben & Jerry’s announced plans last year to separate its €8bn ice cream division, but questions remained over exactly how it would be done.
Unilever made the announcement alongside its full-year results for 2024. It reported underlying sales growth of 4%, falling short of the 4.1% forecast by analysts.
Its share price is down 6% since markets opened.
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Morning update:
Nestlé has hailed a “solid” performance in 2024 with better-than-expected sales growth in the final quarter.
The group registered organic sales growth of 2.7% in the final three months of the year, higher than analyst estimates of 2%.
Analysts had feared the Swiss food giant could scrap its margin guidance, but Nestlé maintained the forecast.
Its share price is up 6% since markets opened.
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Applied Nutrition has comfortably beaten sales guidance given at the time of its IPO as the sports nutrition group published a maiden trading update.
The group said it made “good progress” in the first half to 31 January, with revenues of £47.6m, above the £46m forecast at the time of its flotation.
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British American Tobacco has put aside £6.2bn as it prepares for the end of a long-running lawsuit in Canada.
A Quebec court ordered British American Tobacco, alongside Philip Morris International and Japan Tobacco, in 2015 to pay billions of dollars to compensate smokers for health problems.
The maker of Lucky Strike and Dunhill cigarettes posted results for 2024, with revenue down 5.2% to £25.9bn, below expectations of £26.1bn. This was led by the sale of its businesses in Russia and Belarus in September 2023 and currency rates.
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Bottler Coca-Cola HBC has warned of slowing profit growth in 2025 amid a challenging macroeconomic environment.
While it posted strong organic revenue growth of 13.8% to €10.8bn for 2024, it expects this to fall to 6% to 8% in the year.
Operating profits were up 24% in 2024, but Coca-Cola expects this to fall to between 7% and 11% in 2025 amid uncertainty caused by US tariffs.
Tate & Lyle’s revenue fell 4% in the three months to 31 December as it passed through falling commodity prices.
Its balance sheet was boosted however by the acquisition of CP Kelco in November, which has already delivered £66m in revenue.
“This was another quarter of good volume and EBITDA performance,” said CEO Nick Hampton. “Each region delivered volume growth, and we saw strong productivity and cash delivery.”
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