Hilton Food Group performing “ahead of expectations”

Hilton Food Group said today (14 January) its performance in the year to 3 January came in “ahead of the board’s expectations”. 

In western Europe, the UK-based meat packer said volume growth in its domestic market and the Netherlands more than offset lower demand in Denmark. Sweden “remained steady”, the company added.

In central Europe, Hilton said conditions were “competitive” but it nevertheless performed “in line” with forecasts with growth in Poland, Hungary and the Baltics. Elsewhere, Hilton said its joint venture with Woolworths plc in Australia “continued to make good progress” and was “positioned for future expansion”. 

Looking to 2016, Hilton said: “Although the environment remains competitive, the outlook for 2016 remains positive. The group’s financial position remains strong, leaving us well positioned for future expansion.  We remain well placed to deliver continued growth over the medium term and will continue to explore further opportunities to develop our business in both domestic and overseas markets.”

Analysts at Shore Capital upgraded their expectations based on the trading update. “We are upgrading our FY2015 forecasts by 4.5%, taking our core pre-tax profit expectation from GBP25.9m (US$37.2m), to GBP27m, EPS of 26.4p, so growth of circa 7% year-on-year despite currency headwinds across its activities we estimate at 6-7%.”

Hilton is scheduled to publish its full fiscal 2015 results at the end of March.