Good response helps H&M 9MFY15 sales soar 22%

26 Sep '15

3 min read

Good response to its collections from all brands at global apparel retailer H&M resulted in sales soaring 22 per cent during the nine months period ending August 31, 2015.

In a press release, H&M said its sales for the nine months of fiscal 2015 excluding VAT, surged 22 per cent to SEK 132,167 million as against SEK 108,775 million in the comparable period of previous fiscal.

Profit after financial items for the reporting period amounted to SEK 20,094 million, up 11 per cent from SEK 18,096 million in the corresponding nine months of last fiscal.

The group's profit after tax too rose 12 per cent to SEK 15,372 million or SEK 9.29 earnings per share compared with SEK 13,754 million or SEK 8.31 earnings per share.

For the third fiscal quarter ending August 31, 2015 sales excluding VAT drove up 19 percent to SEK 46,024 million, vis-à-vis SEK 38,805 million in the same quarter of fiscal 2014.

Gross profit for the quarter under review stood at SEK 25,712 million, up 14 per cent year over year, while gross margin as a percentage of sales also grew to 55.9 per cent as against 58.3 per cent.

However, profit after financial items remained nearly flat in the third quarter of fiscal 2015 over the prior fiscal's third quarter at SEK 6,936 million.

Its profit after tax for the reporting quarter totaled to SEK 5,306 million or SEK 3.21 earnings per share compared with SEK 5,296 million or SEK 3.20 earnings per share.

In the third quarter of the current fiscal, H&M said its first store in Macau was well received on its opening in 2015, with India and South Africa to be new H&M markets in October 2015.

The Swedish retailer has hiked its online presence in eight more new countries till now in 2015, with online presence planned for Switzerland and Russia in the current fiscal.

In the fourth quarter, H&M will open approximately 240 new stores, which is almost three new stores per day.

In fiscal 2016, H&M plans to offer ecommerce in a further nine existing H&M markets and also open stores in three new markets namely New Zealand, Cyprus and Puerto Rico.

CEO Karl-Johan Persson said, “Profits have developed well during the first nine months of the year, although profits in the third quarter were negatively affected by increased purchasing costs due to the strong US dollar.”

“As always, we are reviewing our customer offering in each market and we are monitoring the market closely to ensure that we offer the best combination of fashion, quality, price and sustainability,” he added. (AR)

Fibre2Fashion News Desk – India

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