The upheavals in the Chinese sports market, as reported elsewhere in this issue, have also slashed the turnover of Exceed, the company that sells the Xidelong brand. Its sales shrank by 27.5 percent to 2,383.5 million yuan renminbi (€298.5m-$383.2m) for the full year and the situation deteriorated markedly in the fourth quarter, as sales contracted by 48.8 percent to RMB373.7 million (€46.8m-$60.1m). Its gross profit margin declined by just 1.9 percentage points to 28.3 percent, but due to its sharply declining sales the group's gross profit was down by 31.9 percent and its operating profit sank by 53.5 percent to RMB231.8 million (€29.0m-$37.3m). It still managed a net profit of RMB198.9 million (€24.9m-$32.0m), but that was a drop of 57.7 percent compared with 2011. Like many rivals in China, Exceed has been striving to align inventories with demand by scaling back production and deliveries. Unlike some others the number of Xidelong stores did increase to 4,909 but that was a net increase of just 65 stores. The company warned that it should be adversely affected this year by the tepid growth of the Chinese economy as well as the industry-wide cleanup in the sports market.

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