SABMiller’s full year profit up 1.5 percent in a difficult market
EBITA was up 17 percent in Latin America and 7 percent in North America, where SABMiller is a partner in MillerCoors. In Europe, however, earnings were down 8 percent as lager volume fell by 5 percent.
SABMiller said cost cutting at the MillerCoors LLC joint venture helped North American earnings rise, while profit from South African beer and soft drinks operations climbed 16 percent.
Lager volumes in Asia grew 7 percent for the year. Full year lager volume growth in China of 10 percent on an organic basis was driven by market share gains with stronger growth in the first half.
However, regulatory issues in India caused volumes to fall 14 percent with some loss of market share.
Group EBITA rose 6 percent to USD 4.38 billion (EUR 3.6 billion). The profit growth came on price increases, as beer volumes were steady on a comparable basis. “To achieve flat volumes with firm pricing across the globe in circumstances like this has been a tremendous achievement,” said CEO Graham Mackay.
Net debt was reduced by USD 311 million during the year to USD 8.39 billion (EUR 6.9 billion), the company said. SABMiller has the smallest borrowings of the world’s four largest brewers on a net debt/EBITA ratio.
In the first quarter this year SABMiller said that lager volume rose 2 percent. That compared with a 0.8 percent increase at AB-InBev and a 5.3 percent decline at Dutch rival Heineken.
In the current year, SABMiller said it didn’t expect a broad recovery in consumer spending until the second half of its fiscal year, beginning in October.
