BERLIN, April 8 (Xinhua) -- Henkel is expecting sales to grow between two and four percent in fiscal year 2019, the German chemical and consumer goods company announced at its annual general meeting on Monday.

"We are pursuing a clear long-term strategy for Henkel: We want to generate sustainable profitable growth," said Hans Van Bylen, chief executive officer (CEO) of Henkel.

The German manufacturer of consumer goods such like detergent and shampoo also announced the highest dividend in its history. The company is planning to pay 1.85 euros (2.08 U.S. dollars) per share, marking an increase of 3.4 percent.

Henkel reiterated its announcement made in January, to step up investments by around 300 million euros (338.1 million U.S. dollars) annually from 2019 onwards in order to capture additional growth opportunities mainly in its consumer goods businesses as well as to further accelerate its digital transformation.

Back in January, Henkel had also revealed that its EBIT margin will only range between 16 and 17 percent in the fiscal year 2019. In fiscal year 2018, Henkel had achieved an EBIT margin of 17.6 percent. Share prices of the German consumer goods company plummeted by around 10 percent afterwards.

Van Bylen still remained bullish, "Henkel is financially very healthy. In 2018, we continued to deliver profitable growth for Henkel. We achieved good organic growth with new highs in earnings and profitability."

In fiscal year 2018, Henkel's turnover decreased slightly by 0.6 percent to a total of 19.9 billion euros while net profits declined by 8.3 percent to 2.3 billion euros, the company announced in February.

Van Bylen warned that "we continue to operate in a challenging market environment which is characterized by uncertainties and volatility".

"Overall, we expect the currency effects to become weaker in fiscal 2019 compared to the prior year. But we still expect a negative impact in the low single-digit percentage range. We also anticipate an increase of commodity prices in the low single-digit percentage range," Van Bylen added.

After the annual general meeting, investors were satisfied with Henkel. Share prices of the consumer goods company temporarily increased by over 2.5 percent and were the winner in the German stock index DAX on Monday. (1 euro = 1.13 U.S. dollars) Enditem

Related

Go to Forum >>0 Comment(s)