Kingfisher Plc grows market share in all key regions

Kingfisher Plc (LON:KGF) has announced its final results for the year ended 31 January 2025.

Strong delivery against strategic objectives & market share gains in all key regions

Thierry Garnier, Chief Executive Officer, said:

“For the first time in over six years, we grew our market share in all key regions. We delivered profit and free cash flow in line with or ahead of our initial guidance, with strong delivery against our strategic objectives. Our e-commerce marketplaces are now live in the UK & Ireland, France, Poland and Iberia, and growing strongly with total GMV up 62%. Our trade sales penetration, excluding Screwfix, reached 17.9% in January, up 4.9%pts, with rapid progress being made in France and Poland. Our restructuring of Castorama France is progressing and we have accelerated our plans. As expected, the wider market backdrop was a headwind, though we maintained our laser focus on managing costs and cash, removing £120m of structural costs and lowering same-store inventory by over £100m.

“Looking to the year ahead, the recent government budgets in the UK and France have raised costs for retailers and impacted consumer sentiment in the near term. With this in mind, we remain focused on what is in our control – progressing our strategic objectives at pace to deliver further market share gains, and continuing to manage gross margin, costs and cash effectively. Kingfisher is in its best operational shape for years, and we remain confident about the growth opportunities in our business.”

Key messages

·      Market share gains in the UK & Ireland, France and Poland, driven by e-commerce & trade

·      Total sales -0.8% and LFL -1.7%. Core categories (67% of sales) driving resilience; encouraging ‘big-ticket’ sales trends in Q4

·      Adjusted PBT (£528m) and free cash flow (£511m) delivered in line with or ahead of initial guidance; statutory PBT down 35.4% to £307m

·      Focused execution against strategic objectives. Strong growth in e-commerce (sales penetration up 1.6%pts to 19.0%), and trade customer sales excluding Screwfix +53.0% YoY

·      Accelerating Castorama France restructuring, with works in motion or completed on a total of 24 low-performing stores by end of FY 25/26. Operating costs in France down 1.6% YoY

·      Against a challenging market backdrop, maintained a disciplined financial performance, with strong management of gross margin (+50bps), costs (c.£120m of structural cost reductions, as guided) and same-store net inventory (down £107m)

FY 25/26 outlook and guidance

·      Guiding to FY 25/26 adjusted PBT of £480m to £540m⁽²⁾, and free cash flow of £420m to £480m

·      New £300m share buyback programme announced

·      Remain confident about the medium to longer-term outlook for the sector; targeting free cash flow of >£500m per annum from FY 26/27

The remainder of this release consists of 7 main sections:

1)    Financial performance summary and current trading & outlook

2)    Strategy highlights

3)    Technical guidance for FY 25/26

4)    Trading review by division

5)    Financial review (and, in part 2 of this announcement, the condensed financial statements)

6)    Glossary

7)    Forward-looking statements

Footnotes

⁽¹⁾ The Board has proposed a final dividend per share of 8.60p (FY 23/24 final dividend: 8.60p), resulting in a proposed total dividend per share of 12.40p in respect of FY 24/25 (FY 23/24: 12.40p). The final dividend is subject to the approval of shareholders at the Annual General Meeting on 23 June 2025.

⁽²⁾ Guidance assumes current exchange rates.

Non-GAAP measures and other terms

Throughout this release ‘*’ indicates the first instance of a term defined and explained in the Glossary (Section 6). Not all the figures and ratios used are readily available from the unaudited final results included in part 2 of this announcement. Management believes that these non-GAAP measures (or ‘Alternative Performance Measures’), including adjusted profit measures, constant currency and like-for-like (LFL) sales growth, are useful and necessary to assist the understanding of the Group’s results. Where required, a reconciliation to statutory amounts is set out in the Financial Review (Section 5).

Results presentation and Q&A

We will host an in-person results presentation for pre-registered analysts and investors today at 09.00 (UK time) at the London Stock Exchange, 10 Paternoster Square, London, EC4M 7LS. A simultaneous live video webcast of the presentation and Q&A will also be available via the Investors section of our website at www.kingfisher.com, and subsequently available on demand.

Financial calendar

^± Dates are provisional and may be subject to change