Carrefour SA, France’s largest retailer, reported an increase in full-year profit as a revival in Europe helped drive the fourth straight year of revenue growth.
Recurring operating income rose 2.4 per cent to €2.45 billion ($2.7 billion), Boulogne-Billancourt, France-based Carrefour said Thursday in a statement. That matched the average of 24 analysts’ estimates. Adjusting for exchange rates and excluding some items such as the integration of DIA discount stores Carrefour bought back in France, earnings rose 12 per cent.
Carrefour is out of the casualty ward that Chief Executive Officer Georges Plassat found it in four years ago, according to Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Charles Allen.
The CEO is now looking to generate the next stage of growth, which will involve reviving the grocer’s European non-food business as well as boosting Chinese sales, which fell last year. Rival Casino Guichard-Perrachon SA on Wednesday reported a 35 per cent drop in profit, hurt by price cuts in France.
“In 2016, the group will continue opening stores in its different formats, notably in convenience, at a sustained pace,” Carrefour said. The company said it plans to invest €2.5 billion to €2.6 billion and maintain its debt rating, which Standard & Poor’s has at BBB+.
The retailer is raising its dividend 2.9 per cent to 70 cents a share, short of the Bloomberg forecast for 74 cents. Carrefour’s sales rose 3 per cent last year on an organic basis, the retailer said January 15.
The grocer said it will also convert another 500 DIA stores this year.
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