Unilever Nigeria Grows Profit by 61% to N4.437 Billion

Unilever Nigeria Grows Profit by 61% to N4.437 Billion

Unilever Nigeria Plc grew profit after tax by about 61% in the first half of 2024 to N4.437 billion from N2.76 billion in the comparable period in 2023, it unaudited financial statement revealed.

Revenue increased by 40.9% year on year to N63.908 billion from N45.35 billion 12 months earlier, driven by a broad-based increase across the Food Products, Personal Care and Beauty & Wellbeing segments.

The company’s strong topline was driven by price hikes in response to high input costs and improved volume performance.  Analysts said Unilever Nigeria Plc raised its prices across its product portfolio by about 9.7% in 2024 as inflation pressures persist.

Cost of sales rose marginally by 16.8% year on year to N37.7 billion, following the positive dual impacts of a material revaluation gain of N2.4 billion as against loss of N14.4 billion and a restructuring write-back of N301.2 million, which analysts said dampened the effect of high raw material costs.

In the period, the consumer goods company double down gross profit performance. This was helped by slower costs of sales growth. Costs of sales grew by 16.84% year on year, from N32.258 billion to N37.69 billion, tracking behind sales revenue growth in the period.

Unilever Nigeria’s gross profit which settled at N26.218 billion was 100.26% more than N13.091 billion posted in the comparable period in 2023.

The consumer goods company reported finance income declined to N4.10 billion in H1 2024 from N4.45 billion in H1 2023. This decrease was due to lower interest received from its bank accounts, which fell to N810 million in H1 2024 from N1.51 billion in H1 2023.

However, a significant contribution to the company’s finance income came from FX gains, which increased to N3.92 billion in H1 2024 from N2.93 billion in H1 2023.

Meanwhile, finance costs declined by 29.1% year on year to N1.28 billion in H1 2024 despite elevated lending rate in the financial markets, down from N1.80 billion in H1 2023.

Analysts said the reduction was primarily due to a decrease in interest on third-party bank loans, which dropped to N1.17 billion in H1 2024 from N1.72 billion in H1 2023.

Helped in boosting the bottom line, the company’s net finance Income rose by 6.8% year on year to N2.83 billion in H1 2024, up from N2.65 billion in H1 2023.

The company’s profit before tax which settled at N6.282 billion was 7.3% higher than N5.853 billion reported in H1-2023.

Thus, profit from continuous operation of the company was N4.437 billion in H1-2024, which was 8.3% above N4.097 billion Unilever Nigeria achieved in the comparable period in 2023.

Profit after tax in H1-2024 surged by 60.7% to N4.437 billion due to loss from discontinued operation which reduced the company’s bottom line in H1-2023 to N2.762 billion. Civil Society Coalition Condemns Dangote, NMDPRA, Rift