Kingfisher, Europe's biggest home improvements retailer, said it would meet forecasts for a 20 per cent rise in year profit after posting sales growth and market share gains in its fourth quarter.
"Our established programme of self-help initiatives has continued to serve us well and so we expect to announce full year adjusted profit in line with the current consensus of analyst expectations," said chief executive Ian Cheshire.
This stood at £799 million (€962.5 million), prior to today’s update, up from £670 million in 2010-11.
Kingfisher, which runs British market leader B&Q as well as Castorama and Brico Depot in France and elsewhere, said its total sales rose 4.0 per cent on a constant currency basis to £2.36 billion in the 13 weeks to January 28th, its fiscal fourth quarter.
The group, with about 900 stores in eight countries, said sales at Castorama France stores open over a year rose 2.9 per cent and were up 5.7 per cent at Brico Depot France stores.
That beat analysts' forecasts for rises of about 0.9 per cent and 2.0 per cent respectively.
Like-for-like sales at B&Q stores in the UK and Ireland fell 2.5 per cent compared with analysts' expectations of a fall of about 2.0 per cent.
Many European retailers are struggling as disposable incomes are squeezed by rising prices, muted wages growth and government austerity measures, and amid fears the euro zone debt crisis could plunge the region back into recession.
Kingfisher has performed better than most, offsetting weak demand in many of its markets with a drive to improve profitability by buying more goods centrally, and directly, from cheaper manufacturing centres like China.
Reuters
