Shares in Kerry Group fell sharply on Tuesday, after the company reported a 2.5pc decline in revenue last year, to €6.758bn, in significant part reflecting the weaker dollar.
Sales volumes, margins and earnings per share (EPS) were all up, however, in the first full year since the sale of the relatively lower-margin Irish dairy business to Kerry Co-op.
The currency hit reflects the fact that the USA is Kerry’s biggest market – with North America as a whole contributing €3.67bn of last year’s sales versus Europe’s €1.44bn.
The sharp drop in the dollar relative to the euro – a swing from close to parity in early 2025 to $1.19 by the end of the year – did impact the results, Mr Scanlon said.
However, he said the company would not use financial tools to mitigate those effects, relying instead on its own operations.
“We don’t hedge currencies. We focus on underlying performance and we focus on volume growth,” he told the Irish Independent.
Kerry’s Irish stock-market listed peers that have very large dollar exposures, like CRH and Flutter, and US investors have moved either their primary listing or their reporting currency to the US and the dollar in recent years.
In both cases, they have benefited from higher US share valuations and less currency volatility. Kerry is not interested in following that trend, Mr Scanlon said.
“We are a European company, we are an Irish company, first and foremost,” he said.
Kerry sells into 150 markets and currency volatility is inevitable in such a global business, he pointed out.
“Our job is try to navigate that as best we can,” he said.
Kerry does that by largely manufacturing and selling within currency areas – de-risking the ‘geographic footprint’ of the business, he said.
It means there are few concerns around the potential impact of tariffs, he said.
The US political climate – specifically the Make America Healthy Again drive – is throwing up growth opportunities for Kerry Group’s taste and ingredients business, he said.
A policy-driven shift in US food manufacturing away from high-sugar, high-salt and high saturated fats recipes is triggering large scale re-formulation of food products with Kerry well placed to provide healthier taste alternatives, he said. Kerry’s US snacks and bakery lines have seen significant growth in a flat or a declining market, he said.
A possible US adoption of food ‘traffic light labelling’ systems already seen in the UK and some European markets could accelerate that trend, he thinks.
The other major food trend impacting Kerry is the mass use of Ozempic and other GLP-1 weight-loss drugs.
“It is hard to measure the impact but it is there,” Mr Scanlon said.
The big impact is that consumers who use those drugs eat less, but it also throws up new nutritional needs, he said.
Kerry Group is working with clients to develop high protein, small portion, products and other supplements and beverages tailored around GLP-1 use, he said.
Kerry’s shares in Dublin were down sharply in early trading today – falling 3.8pc to €75.50 a share, the biggest faller in a generally weak start for shares on Dublin’s Euronext.
Commenting on the results themselves, Mr Scanlon said it had been a year of strong end-market volume outperformance and margin expansion.
“Volume growth was driven by a strong performance in the Americas throughout the year. This was led by foodservice innovation and increased nutritional renovation across a broad range of customers, given our positioning as a leader in sustainable nutrition, with customers looking to address nutrition, taste, cost or sustainability aspects,” he said.
In 2026, Kerry is “well positioned for strong market outperformance”, he said.
“We expect to deliver continued volume growth and margin expansion, resulting in constant currency adjusted earnings per share growth of 6pc to 10pc.”
Even so, Kerry said results for food and beverage markets in the year reflected “soft overall consumer demand, given macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty”.
Preliminary full-year results for 2025 record revenue of €6.758bn, earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) of €1.208bn and Ebitda margin up +80bps to 17.9pc.
Adjusted earnings per share rose 7.5pc to 481.5 cent. The business generated free cash flow of €643m reflecting 81pc cash conversion.
Kerry announced a new chair, Dubliner Fiona Dawson, a 33-year veteran of Mars International and non-executive director at Marks & Spencer, Reckitt and Lego. She replaces the retiring Tom Moran.
He is due to retire at the end of the annual general meeting on April 30. Ms Dawson has been a non-executive director at Kerry Group since 2022.
The group has launched a new €300m share buyback programme and a final dividend of 98 cent per share.
Davy Stockbroker’s Cathal Kenny said Kerry Group had delivered a solid 2025 result with good progress on volume and margin, against a subdued demand environment.
“Volume growth was ahead of end-markets, driven by strong execution in the foodservice channel. EPS was in line. The 2026 outlook calls for 6-10pc constant currency EPS growth with FX a c.4pc headwind. Adjusting for FX, we anticipate an EPS forecast in the zone of 501c (from 514c),” he said.
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