Associated British Foods, the Silver Spoon sugar refiner and owner of Primark discount clothes stores, posted a 3% fall in year profits but added most of its businesses continued to trade well.
The London-based food and retail group said that adjusted pre-tax profits slipped to £559m sterling in the year to September 16, towards the top of analyst forecasts.
'Most of our businesses continue to trade well and expect positive developments in their results. The profitability of the European sugar businesses will be further affected by the consequences of the EU sugar regime reform,' the group said.
The company had already warned of lower earnings back in September due to a cut in European Union sugar support prices hurting its British Sugar refiner, higher wheat prices hitting its Kingsmill breadmaking business and higher energy prices.
It confirmed its discount clothing Primark stores showed like-for-like sales growth of 3% in the year after flat second-half sales as its big acquisition-led expansion push led to cannabilisation of current stores and the market slowed.
Primark has been driven by the growth in the discount fashion business, but was expected to confirm a cooling in its relentless underlying sales growth after the acquisition of high street sites from Allders and Littlewoods took sales away from its older stores.
