TRADING UPDATE
Imperial Tobacco Group PLC confirms that the overall financial position and operational performance of the Group for the financial year to 30 September 2012 is in line with the Board's expectations.
We are delivering strong gains from our key strategic brands and improving our revenue momentum through our focus on driving quality growth across our total tobacco portfolio.
Tobacco net revenues are expected to be up by around four per cent with particularly good performances in our Eastern Europe, Africa & Middle East and Asia-Pacific regions.
Stick equivalent volumes are expected to decline by up to three per cent, the majority of which is due to ongoing market weakness in Ukraine (cigarette) and Poland (fine cut tobacco) and compliance with international trade sanctions against Syria.
We are making excellent progress with our key strategic brands Davidoff, Gauloises Blondes, West and JPS and expect this to be reflected in further strong volume and revenue gains from these brands which continue to represent an increasing proportion of our volumes.
Imperial Tobacco expects to release its results for the year ending 30 September 2012 on Tuesday 30 October 2012.
