Latest news with #JeronimoMartins
Mint
03-08-2025
- Business
- Mint
A Punchy €50 Billion Sales Goal Gets J. Martins Mulling Over M&A
(Bloomberg) -- Jeronimo Martins, which made its last major acquisition almost two decades ago, may have to shift to a more aggressive strategy in order to boost sales by 50% within five years. A target of €50 billion in revenue by 2029 or 2030 has kickstarted internal discussions since it was first announced by Chairman Pedro Soares dos Santos in March. While Soares dos Santos — whose family controls the business — said the company is working on a plan to hit that goal, he hasn't publicly explained what it might look like. 'The chairman said very clearly that he's setting that target as an ambition for the group,' Chief Financial Officer Ana Luisa Virginia said in an interview in Lisbon on Aug. 1, after the company reported earnings. 'If the €50 billion can be achieved with or without M&A? I would say most probably with it.' For analysts, a potential target would be rivals operating in Poland, the firm's most important market. That includes assets owned by France's Carrefour SA as it goes through a strategic review of its portfolio to boost its valuation. Carrefour was one of the top M&A targets in Europe in a recent Bloomberg News survey of risk-arbitrage desks, traders and analysts. But Virginia said anti-monopoly rules mean Jeronimo Martins would 'not be allowed' to own the whole Carrefour chain in Poland, where her company already controls almost 30% of the market. She declined to comment on whether Jeronimo Martins is interested in buying any of Carrefour's assets on a smaller scale. 'We are monitoring the situation,' said Virginia, referring to the possible sale of Carrefour's operations in Poland. 'We think that there are still white spaces in the Polish market that we prefer to occupy ourselves rather than leave it for our competitors.' The Portuguese retailer has traditionally prioritized growing its business from within or via small asset purchases, particularly in Poland where it owns the country's biggest supermarket chain Biedronka. While this year it expanded into a new market — Slovakia — Jeronimo Martins is known for a conservative approach when it comes to considering snapping up other businesses. 'We are very careful,' Virginia said from the company's head office in Lisbon. 'Up until now we only acquired things that made sense to our business. We don't buy to sell, and this of course means we do mergers and acquisitions every 10 years or so.' Jeronimo Martins's last major purchase was completed in 2008 after it agreed with Tengelmann Group to buy its Plus discount supermarkets in Portugal and Poland for about €320 million. While Jeronimo Martins is constantly looking at opportunities in new markets, Virginia said, current acquisitions involve buying small portfolios of stores from retailers that are rolling back or shutting down their operations in markets where the company already has a presence. The Portuguese retailer's latest deal involved buying 75 supermarkets in Colombia from Colsubsidio. It now plans to spend about €1 billion in boosting its operations in existing markets — Portugal, Poland, Colombia and Slovakia. This year's first-half sales increased 6.7% to €17.4 billion, helping the shares recover 11% in 2025. Virginia, who was M&A director at Jeronimo Martins until 2008, says she gets pitched on acquisitions from investment bankers 'all the time.' 'We are good friends' with the investment bankers, she said. 'I always say that we are the worst clients.' More stories like this are available on
Bloomberg
03-08-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
A Punchy €50 Billion Sales Goal Gets J. Martins Mulling Over M&A
Jeronimo Martins, which made its last major acquisition almost two decades ago, may have to shift to a more aggressive strategy in order to boost sales by 50% within five years. A target of €50 billion in revenue by 2029 or 2030 has kickstarted internal discussions since it was first announced by Chairman Pedro Soares dos Santos in March. While Soares dos Santos — whose family controls the business — said the company is working on a plan to hit that goal, he hasn't publicly explained what it might look like.
Reuters
01-08-2025
- Business
- Reuters
Jeronimo Martins warns of market challenges, quarterly profit drops
LISBON, Aug 1 (Reuters) - Portuguese retailer Jeronimo Martins ( opens new tab posted a near 9% fall in second-quarter net profit on Friday, even as sales and core earnings rose, and warned of enduring fierce competition and restrained consumption, leading to a 5% drop in its shares. The company, whose main market is Poland, where it operates the country's largest food retailer Biedronka, booked a net profit of 142 million euros ($162 million) in the quarter. Sales rose 9.6% to 9.02 billion euros and earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation jumped 16.5% to 620 million euros. "In an environment that remains volatile, we foresee that consumers will continue to be prudent and restrained, and that market competitive dynamics will stay fierce," Jeronimo Martins said in a statement, adding though that it kept the outlook presented in March broadly unchanged. Chief Financial Officer Ana Luisa Virginia also warned that, although usually sales in the second half are higher than in the first half, "it is not a given ... that we will not also have our challenges in the margin and on the cost side". In the first half, consolidated net profit still rose 6.6% to 269 million euros on sales growth of 6.7%. Operating costs rose over 6% both in the second quarter and first half from a year ago. Analysts pointed to mixed results, only modest same-store sales growth, and the pessimistic tone of the message about the state of the market, particularly in Poland, as the main reasons behind the fall in Jeronimo Martins shares. Even as a 9.2% minimum wage increase in Poland boosted household disposable income, "for now, food retail competition is intense, and overall food consumption is relatively contained", the company said. ($1 = 0.8765 euros)
Yahoo
21-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Jeronimo Martins Targets €50 Billion in Sales Within Five Years
(Bloomberg) -- Jeronimo Martins SGPS SA, Portugal's biggest retailer by market value, is working on a strategic plan for the next five years that will involve boosting annual sales to as much as €50 billion ($54 billion). New York Subway Ditches MetroCard After 32 Years for Tap-And-Go Amtrak CEO Departs Amid Threats of a Transit Funding Pullback Despite Cost-Cutting Moves, Trump Plans to Remake DC in His Style LA Faces $1 Billion Budget Hole, Warns of Thousands of Layoffs NYC Plans for Flood Protection Without Federal Funds 'We're working on a plan to find out exactly which areas we want to grow,' Chief Executive Officer Pedro Soares dos Santos said at a press conference in Lisbon on Thursday. 'We have the ambition to reach €50 billion in sales by 2029 or 2030.' Jeronimo Martins, which also operates in eastern Europe, said late on Wednesday that 2024 revenue rose 9.3% to €33 billion. The owner of Biedronka, Poland's biggest supermarket chain, will continue to offer low prices in a bid to bolster sales amid fierce competition in the markets where it operates, Soares dos Santos said. The CEO said agribusiness may 'play a role' in his company's plan to increase revenue. He didn't say when Jeronimo Martins would present its new strategic program. 'We have to assess the current value of our operations and what needs to be included in our portfolio and in that sense agribusiness can play a role,' Soares dos Santos said. The Biedronka unit currently accounts for more than 70% of the group's revenue. Jeronimo Martins bought the Polish retailer in 1997. It has promoted the brand's 'everyday low prices' while building up the operation from a couple of hundred stores mostly in smaller, hardscrabble cities, to a network of more than 3,700 stores and about 30% of the Polish market. Biedronka opened its first stores in Slovakia earlier this month. Jeronimo Martins is also investing in expanding in its home market of Portugal as well as in Colombia, where it operates the Ara chain. 'There's no doubt that we've had a decade of great growth and consolidation, and now we have to look at the next five years,' Soares dos Santos said. 'This is what will be the biggest challenge for this executive committee.' (Adds CEO's comments from fifth paragraph.) A New 'China Shock' Is Destroying Jobs Around the World Tesla's Gamble on MAGA Customers Won't Work How TD Became America's Most Convenient Bank for Money Launderers The Real Reason Trump Is Pushing 'Buy American' The Future of Higher Ed Is in Austin ©2025 Bloomberg L.P.
