Category: News This Week

The Imperial Tobacco Group’s half year results for the six months to March 31 are expected to be released on April 30.

The interim dividend is due to be paid on August 16 to shareholders on the register at July 19.

Japan Tobacco International has appointed its regional sales and marketing vice-president for the Asia region as the new managing director of its UK division, according to a story by Alex Ralph for The Times.

Jorge da Motta, who has been based in Hong Kong, will replace Martin Southgate who retired last month.

Cigarettes have been in short supply in Sri Lanka since the Ceylon Tobacco Co. (CTC) stopped distributing them on Feb. 27, reports Daily Mirror.

A new law requires cigarette manufacturers print pictorial health warnings on its packs before releasing them to the market.

The CTC went to court over the new regulations, which were introduced by the health ministry. The Court of Appeal refused a stay order on the regulations and the matter is now before the Supreme Court.

Sources said the CTC was going ahead with the printing of pictorial health warnings on new packets of cigarettes.

New packets of Gold Leaf cigarettes would reportedly be introduced to the market by March 2 while the new packets of Dunhill cigarettes would be in the market by March 10.

The results of a new survey indicating that a high percentage of teenager tobacco users in Alberta, Canada, consume flavored products are being used by anti-tobacco lobbyists to call for a ban on such products.

According to a story by Keith Gerein for the Edmonton Journal, the 2010-11 Youth Smoking Survey conducted by Health Canada polled the tobacco habits of 50,000 Canadian students in grades 6 to 12, including 4,500 from 35 schools in Alberta.

Of the Alberta students who said they used tobacco, 64 per cent were consuming some kind of flavored product, a figure that was ahead of the national average of 59 per cent of those surveyed.

The survey found the most popular product was the flavored cigarillo, which was the product of choice of slightly more than 35 per cent of Alberta’s young tobacco users and 29 per cent of youngsters across Canada.

About 30 per cent of Alberta’s young tobacco users smoked flavored cigars, way ahead of the national average of 19 per cent.

Alberta students also ranked ahead of the national standard in consumption of menthol cigarettes, spit tobacco and water pipe tobacco.

Alberta’s associate minister of wellness, Dave Rodney, suggested that a bill focusing on flavored tobacco products would be introduced in the fall session.

“Everyone knows we have to keep up the fight against tobacco use, especially against those who target our youngest and most vulnerable Albertans,” he said.

“But it has to be well thought out legislation, it has to be effective and enforceable. So we are taking the time necessary to develop a comprehensive package.”

KT&G is in the process of removing descriptors such as ‘lights’ from its packs even though it is under no legal obligation to do so, according to a story in The Korea Herald.

In September, the Korean government tried to revise the National Health Promotion Law to include a ban on words that might misrepresent cigarette products, but its efforts fell victim to differences that emerged among a number of ministries and the proposal never made it to the National Assembly.

A KT&G official was quoted as saying that though the company was not legally bound to alter product names it was doing so in order to reduce the chances that consumers would misinterpret the descriptors.

Under the process, ‘Timeless TIME lights’ has become ‘Timeless TIME MID’.

And so far three versions of Esse Soon have become Esse Soo. Soon translates to ‘pure’ or ‘mild’, while soo translates to ‘excellent’.

Cigarettes have become more affordable in Sri Lanka during the past 10 years.

A recent story in the Daily Mirror newspaper said that a study conducted on behalf of the National Authority on Tobacco and Alcohol (NATA) by Verité Research had shown that in 2010, cigarettes were relatively cheaper than they were in 2000.

In fact, the affordability of cigarettes in the country was now at a record high.

The study’s authors derived a benchmark from the historical data and used it to demonstrate how cigarette taxation might be increased to keep prices in line with rising wages.

They said that according to the benchmark, the prices of cigarettes in 2010 should have been 50 per cent higher than they were.

British American Tobacco’s cigarette volume during the year to the end of December, at 694 billion, was down by 1.6 per cent on that 2011, 705 billion.

The drop in volume was attributed to industry contractions in Western Europe, Brazil and Egypt, and losses in respect of low value brands in Indonesia and Turkey.

The company’s organic volume was down by 2.0 per cent to 691 billion; or by 1.7 per cent excluding the effect of the Japanese market where foreign manufacturers made volume and shares gains in 2011 following the disruption caused to Japan Tobacco Inc’s manufacturing and distribution operations by the earthquake and tsunami that struck on March 11, 2011.

In BAT’s EEMEA (Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa) region, volume was down by 0.4 per cent to 235 billion; in its Asia Pacific region, volume was down by 1.6 per cent to 188 billion; in its Americas region, volume was down by 0.7 per cent to 142 billion; and in its Western Europe region, volume was down by 4.4 per cent to 129 billion.

The volume accounted for by the company’s global drive brands grew by three per cent, with Lucky Strike up 11 per cent, Pall Mall up three per cent, Dunhill up two per cent and Kent up one per cent (or four per cent taking out the Japan-market effect).

Global drive brands now account for more than a third of BAT’s volume.

BAT’s reporting of other tobacco products was limited to fine-cut volume in Western Europe, which grew by eight per cent to 14,494 tonnes.

The company’s reported revenue was down by one per cent due to adverse currency movements, while revenue at constant rates of exchange was up by four per cent to £15,999 million.

Reported profits from operations increased by 15 per cent while adjusted profit from operations at constant rates of exchange increased by eight per cent to £5,970 million.

Basic earnings per share were up by 26 per cent to 198.1p, while adjusted diluted earnings per share were up by seven per cent to 207.5p.

BAT’s chief executive, Nicandro Durante, said that BAT had exceeded all of its financial objectives in 2012. (Click here to view a video interview about the 2012 results with Durante.)

“We delivered organic revenue growth on a constant currency basis of four per cent and adjusted profit from operations of eight per cent at constant rates of exchange,” he said. “Despite the adverse exchange rates, once again we delivered excellent returns to shareholders, with adjusted diluted earnings per share up by seven per cent on last year, with an increase of 12% at constant exchange rates.

“We grew our underlying market share in 2012, with good share momentum in the second half of the year. Pricing remains strong and, while our cigarette volumes were down slightly, this was mainly due to industry declines in some of our major markets.”

Turning to next-generation products, Durante said that BAT was developing a portfolio of products.

Nicoventures, a company BAT set up in 2011, was aiming to launch nicotine-based products, and in December BAT had acquired CN Creative, a UK-based company specialising in the development of e-cigarette technologies.

Molins’ sales during the year to the end of December, at £93.0 million, were up by three per cent on those of 2011, £89.9 million.

Its underlying profit before tax was up by nine per cent to £4.9 million and its underlying earnings per share was increased by 19 per cent to 21.8p.

Tobacco Machinery sales were down by nine per cent to £31.1m, but operating profit before exceptional items was maintained at £2.2 million.

Sales within the group’s Scientific Services division, which comprises Arista Laboratories and Cerulean, increased by nine per cent £23.1 million, but operating profit, before exceptional items, decreased by 37 per cent to £1.2 million, mainly as a result of increased infrastructure costs and a ‘particularly uneven work-load at Arista’.

Packaging Machinery sales increased by 12 per cent to £38.8 million, while operating profit, before exceptional items, rose from £0.4 million in 2011 to £1.5 million in 2012.

The chief executive, Dick Hunter, said that the group had continued to show good progress during the year, delivering both increased sales and underlying earnings.

“We have also continued to invest across the group, with a particular emphasis on opportunities within the Scientific Services division,” he said.

“Looking ahead, we have entered 2013 with a good order book and are well placed to make further progress with our various growth initiatives during the year.”

The Altria Group has lost a bid to block a 2009 New York City law banning the sale of flavored smokeless tobacco products except in tobacco bars, according to a CSP (Convenience Store/Petroleum) story quoting a Bloomberg report.

The US appeals court in New York on Tuesday upheld a lower-court ruling that rejected arguments by two Altria units, US Smokeless Tobacco Manufacturing and US Smokeless Tobacco Brands, that the city’s measure was pre-empted by federal law.

Brian May, a spokesperson for Altria, was quoted as saying that the company was disappointed with the court’s decision and was considering its options.