Yue Yuen, the world’s largest footwear manufacturer, generated strong nine-month manufacturing results. But the group’s retail arm, Pou Sheng Intl., suffered from soft sales momentum with weak traffic across various Chinese cities “amid a mixed consumption landscape.”
Profit attributable to company owners rose by 120 percent year-over-year to $331.7 million from $137.7 million for the period ended Sep. 30. Ebit was up by 101 percent to $438.5 million versus $218.0 million. Gross margin improved by 70 basis points to 24.2 percent as revenues increased by 1.5 percent year-over-year to $6.075 billion from $5.986 billion.
Total shoe pairs increased by 16.2 percent to 186.9 million from 160.9 million during the first nine months of 2023. Athletic/outdoor shoes accounted for almost 86 percent of the footwear manufacturing revenue over the nine months, rising 7.2 percent year-over-year to $3,248.1 million. For the first six months of 2024, YY’s athletic footwear manufacturing sales were up by 0.5 percent. Casual shoe/sport sandal sales increased by 15.1 percent to $534.6 million, and soles/components/other sales rose by 18.3 percent to $352.8 million. By destination, year-over-year manufacturing shipments to Europe increased by 7.7 percent; rose by 6.0 percent to the US/Rest of Asia/South America/Canada/Australia; and jumped by 19.1 percent for Mainland China.
Pou Sheng sales fell by 11.6 percent to $1,939.8 million from $2,193.8 million and were down by 9.5 percent in reported currency, the Chinese yuan, largely due to weak store traffic.
