Trading Update: BAT’s Business ‘Resilient and Growing’

British American Tobacco’s (BAT) business is performing well in a challenging and volatile trading environment, the company announced in a trading update today.

BAT said it continues to see good pricing and strong volume and value share growth across its combustibles business, together with good share growth across all three of its new categories—vapor, tobacco heating and modern oral.

Results in developed markets—which account for approximately 75 percent of the group’s revenue—are strong, with continued good pricing, little evidence of accelerated downtrading to date and a particularly strong performance from its business in the U.S., which has been highly resilient throughout the Covid-19 crisis.

The impact of Covid-19 in emerging markets, including Bangladesh, Vietnam and Malaysia, has been more pronounced, according to BAT. In addition, closures and other lockdown measures in certain countries, in particular South Africa, Mexico and Argentina, have persisted longer than anticipated.

“We have made a good start to the year, with strong volume and value share growth in combustibles underpinning the sustainability of the business,” said BAT CEO Jack Bowles.

“Our focus on becoming a faster, simpler, more agile business through Project Quantum has positioned us well for continued delivery in the current environment and these efforts have ensured we are a highly resilient company.”

Bowles also referenced the work of its Kentucky Bioprocessing subsidiary, which is developing a potential vaccine for Covid-19. The vaccine candidate has demonstrated its ability to generate an immune response in pre-clinical testing and is poised to move to clinical trials.