The world's second biggest fashion retailer Hennes & Mauritz posted fourth-quarter profits slightly below expectations today and said it would launch a new beauty care concept.
H&M said it planned to keep up its rapid expansion with 400 new stores this fiscal year, nine new online stores as well as a new range of beauty products to be launched in the second half of 2015.
H&M, which has invested heavily in recent years in new concepts to broaden its offer and in online expansion, said most new stores will open in China and the US.
The company said its pretax profit grew to 7.80 billion Swedish crowns ($952.7m) in the three months to the end of November.
That compared with 7.26 billion a year earlier and a mean forecast in a Reuters poll of analysts for 7.96 billion.
"Well-received collections for all our brands and continued strong expansion both in stores and online have helped increase our market share," H&M's chief executive Karl-Johan Persson said on the full year results.
A staff incentive payout weighed on the profit.
H&M, which had already reported quarterly sales, predicted 14% sales growth in January after 15% growth in December, the first month of its fiscal first quarter.
H&M, which trails Zara owner Inditex, proposed a dividend of 9.75 crowns, below a forecast 10.10 crowns.
