Note: Groupe Casino completed the sale of Big C Thailand on March 21, 2016, and is in advanced stages of negotiation to sell its Vietnam business. Considering these events, it has recognized the Asia segment under “discontinued activities,” and has restated its consolidated sales from January 1, 2015, to exclude them for the periods presented in the latest statement. Since the restated numbers were unavailable, only the year-over-year percentage changes have been listed in this report, as shown by Groupe Casino in its 1Q16 press release. The reported consolidated sales for 1Q15, prior to restatement, were €11.9 billion.

1Q16 RESULTS

French retailer Groupe Casino reported a 1Q16 revenue decline of 10.6%, to €9.7 billion. Organic revenue growth (growth at constant exchange rates and scope of consolidation, excluding petrol and calendar effect) was 1.5% during the period, while comps were (0.7)%. The company commented that foreign exchange had negatively impacted revenues by 14.3%. Revenue growth accelerated in France, owing to the performance of the company’s discounters and hypermarkets, but the difficult trading environment in Brazil and unfavorable foreign currency exchange weighed on the group’s results.

PERFORMANCE BY GEOGRAPHY

In France, total sales were up 2.8%, to €4.5 billion. Organic sales growth was 2.9%, while comps were up 1.5%. Among the group’s banners, discounter Leader Price performed best, with year-over-year growth of 6.2% and organic growth of 7.2%. Hypermarket Géant Casino was also a notable performer, growing by 2.9% year over year and by 4.0% organically. Total Latin America retail sales were down 13.7%, but grew by 8.3% organically. Electronics sales fell by 34.6% in reported currency and by 12.7% organically. The company noted that Éxito had seen accelerating growth in Colombia, Uruguay and Argentina, and that GPA Food and Via Varejo in Brazil had both shown improvement. E-commerce sales were down by 18.8% and by 8.3% organically, to €731 million. Cdiscount in France showed gross merchandise volume growth of 18.3%. Cnova reported that gross merchandise volume increased by 4.2% in constant exchange rates.