| Company Announcement No.8 2019 |
Copenhagen, 23 May 2019
Scandinavian Tobacco Group A/S delivers organic EBITDA growth of 7.3% in the first quarter of 2019
Q1 2019 Highlights
- Net sales of DKK 1,464 million (DKK 1,285 million). Organic growth -1.6%
- EBITDA before special items of DKK 239 million (DKK 199 million). Organic growth 7.3%
- EBITDA margin before special items was 16.3% (15.5%). IFRS 16 improved the margin in the first of quarter 2019 by 1.5%-points
- Free cash flow before acquisitions of DKK 72 million (DKK -76 million)
In the first quarter of 2019, Scandinavian Tobacco Group A/S delivered net sales of DKK 1,464 million and EBITDA before special items of DKK 239 million. The quarter delivered 2.4% and 1.6% organic growth in net sales in North America Online & Retail and Region Smoking Tobacco & Accessories respectively. This was offset by negative organic growth in net sales of 9.2% and 3.3% in North America Branded and Region Machine-Made Cigars respectively – and overall the quarter delivered 1.6% negative organic growth in net sales.
CEO of Scandinavian Tobacco Group Niels Frederiksen says: “We are off to a good start to 2019 with overall good organic growth in EBITDA. Our handmade cigars continues to perform well in North America and in France the recovery plan for our machine-made cigars business is showing encouraging results. During the quarter we have also taken important strides in the execution of our transformational program Fuelling the Growth which have resulted in improved operational performance, increased cost efficiency and savings.”
Fuelling the Growth
The transformational program Fuelling the Growth is progressing as planned and is on track to increase commercial competitiveness and deliver net savings at a run-rate of DKK 250 million by the end of 2021. Highlights for Q1 include:
- New organisational structure implemented with new financial reporting
- Market share in our top 5 European machine-made cigar markets increased driven by a recovery in France
Unchanged financial guidance for 2019
The full-year guidance is unchanged:
- >5% organic growth in EBITDA
- Special items of DKK ~85 million
- Free cash flow before acquisitions >DKK 750 million
Conference Call and Webcast
A conference call and webcast will be held on 23 May 2019 at 10:00 AM CET. Presentation materials will be available online approximately one hour before the webcast on investor.st-group.com.
Dial-in details:
Denmark: +45 3272 7518
The UK: +44 (0) 203 009 5710
The US: +1 917 720 0178
Passcode: 7892794
https://edge.media-server.com/m6/p/5nbncjsx
For further information, please contact:
Investors: Torben Sand, Head of Investor Relations,
phone: +45 5084 7222 or torben.sand@st-group.com
Media: Simon Mehl Augustesen, Director of Group Communications,
phone: +45 5084 7211 or simon.augustesen@st-group.com
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