Anheuser-Busch InBev Q1 Profit Surges

(RTTNews) - Anheuser-Busch InBev (AHBIF.PK, BUD) reported that its first-quarter profit attributable to equity holders surged to $3.57 billion or $1.80 per share from $1.02 billion or $0.52 per share in the previous year.

Normalized profit attributable to equity holders of the company rose to $2.516 billion from last year's $1.443 billion, mainly due to lower net finance costs as a result of the positive impact of mark-to-market gains on the hedging of share-based payment programs.

Normalized earnings per share was $1.27, an increase from $0.73 in the prior year, positively impacted by mark-to-market gains linked to the hedging of share-based payment programs.

Underlying profit attributable to equity holders decreased to $1.572 billion from $1.685 billion last year, due to the negative impact of unfavorable currency translation effects.

Revenue declined to $12.59 billion from $13.10 billion in the previous year. But on a organic basis, revenue grew by 5.9% in the quarter, with revenue per hl growth of 4.6%, driven by healthy volume growth, global premiumization and revenue management initiatives. Total volumes grew by 1.3%, with own beer volumes up 1.0% and non-beer volumes up 4.9%.

For fiscal year 2019, the company expects to deliver strong revenue and EBITDA growth, driven by the solid performance of our brand portfolio and strong commercial plans.