PUMA Net Profit Jumped Nearly 40% In The Fiscal Year, And 2 Billion Euros In Shoe Sales.

In February 14th, sports brand PUMA released its fourth quarter financial report in fiscal 2018.

In the three months ending December 2018, all regions and product sectors achieved double-digit growth, pushing global sales up 17.9% to 1 billion 220 million euros over the same period last year, exceeding analysts' estimated 1 billion 170 million euros.

Excluding the effect of exchange rate, this increase can reach 20%.

During the period, the company's net profit jumped from 2 million 200 thousand euros in the same period last year to 15 million 700 thousand euros, an increase of more than 600%.

Gross margin was stable at 47.1%, basically unchanged from the same period last year.

Operating profit was 38 million euros, less than expected 39 million euros.

In 2018, the PUMA brand was founded 70th anniversary, and the annual performance of the sports wave brand has reached a new high year sales year-on-year growth of 12.4% to 4 billion 600 million euros, footwear performance for the first time exceeded 2 billion euro mark, and net profit increased 38% to 187 million euros.

Since 2013, chief executive Bjorn Goulden (BjornGulden) has been growing steadily since taking office.

In the 2016 and 2017 fiscal year, sales of PUMA were 3 billion 600 million euros and 4 billion 30 million euros respectively.

Today, the financial year's performance is another record.

The growth rate of PUMA footwear slowed down during the last quarter.

As a result, chief executive Bjorn Goulden is cautious about the sports shoes market. He thinks, "the sports shoe boom is slowing down."

But from the fourth quarter data, clothing and footwear sales were strong, increasing by 28.6% and 17.4% respectively.

Among them, RS-X and Cali series sneakers are popular in the market.

On the regional market, the Asia Pacific region is far ahead of the 39% sales growth rate, followed by the Americas, an increase of 17%.

Chief executive Bjorn Goulden said in particular that "no sign of slowing economic growth and cooling demand in China, more and more Chinese consumers are buying international brands."

Despite the bright results, the company's share price fell more than 6% after the earnings announcement.

The reason is that sales expectations in 2019 failed to meet the expectations of the capital market.

According to the financial report, the company predicted that sales will slow in 2019. After the adjustment of the exchange rate, sales growth is expected to be about 10% and operating profit is between 395 million and 415 million euros, which is lower than the average analyst expectation of 430 million euros.

In fact, a year ago, PUMA also predicted a 10% increase in sales in 2018, but then gradually increased its annual target.

As the growth of the European base camp slows down and the potential of the Americas plate is significant, PUMA plans to deepen the American market by establishing a second headquarters.

After the completion of the headquarters in North America, PUMA will merge the two subsidiaries in Boston and West Forde to further coordinate the North American market resources.

As an important competitor of PUMA in the North American market, UnderArmour has just released its 2018 fiscal year results, with year-on-year sales rising 4.2% to 5 billion 190 million US dollars - a figure of about 4 billion 600 million euros, which is basically the same as that of PUMA.

It is foreseeable that Under Armour and PUMA will continue to compete fiercely for the third place after Nike and Adidas.