Reckitt Benckiser Shares Drop After Guidance Cut

   By Anthony Shevlin 
 

Shares in Reckitt Benckiser Group PLC (RB.LN) slid in early trading after the FTSE 100 company lowered its full-year net revenue guidance despite saying the second half of the year should be stronger.

The consumer-goods company revised downward its 2019 net revenue guidance growth to between 2% and 3% on a like-for-like basis. The company previously expected growth of between 3% and 4%.

The company behind brands such as Cillit Bang cleaning products and Nurofen painkillers said pretax profit for the six months ended June 30 was 1.26 billion pounds ($1.55 billion), compared with GBP1.11 billion a year prior.

At GMT 0715, shares in Reckitt Benckiser traded 5.2% lower at 6330 pence.

The company acknowledged it made a slow start to the year but said growth levels should return to normal in the second half.

"Our like-for-like performance in 1H was [plus] 1%, somewhat below our expectations," said Rakesh Kapoor, the company's outgoing chief executive.

Analysts at Citi said the company's second-quarter results were disappointing and showed the need for Reckitt to regain strategic flexibility.

"This set of results is making a strategic rethink, and portfolio changes in line with [the] RB 2.0 [strategy], even more pressing," Citi said.

Write to Anthony Shevlin at [e-mail]; @anthony_shevlin

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 30, 2019 03:52 ET (07:52 GMT)

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