Malaysia: BAT Posts Lower H1 Profit at RM415.02m

Source from:  Business Times  07/26/2013

British American Tobacco (Malaysia) Bhd reported a slightly lower net profit of RM415.02 million on RM2.25 billion revenue in the first six months ended June 30.

BAT posted RM415.35 million net profit on RM2.11 billion revenue in the same period last year.

The 0.6 per cent drop in net profit is mainly due to a weakened volume mix in the period under review.

The 6.7 per cent higher revenue was driven by, among others, higher contract manufacturing volume.

The company has declared a second interim dividend of 68 sen per share.

"On the positive side, we managed to strengthen our market leadership with a one percentage point market share growth and registered 61.5 per cent as of June this year, compared to the same period last year," said its managing director Stefano Clini.

He said Dunhill was the key driver of the 1.8 percentage point growth, but this was offset by the declines across the rest of the portfolio.

"In the first half of this year, we experienced a 3.6 per cent volume decline in domestic and duty-free volume versus the same period last year," he added.

For the second quarter ended June 30, BAT's net profit dropped to RM210.82 million from RM220.84 million a year earlier. Enditem