3Q18 Sales Update

Swedish clothing company H&M grew sales including value added tax (VAT) by 9.1% in reporting currency to SEK 64.8 billion, in the third quarter ended August 31. Sales including VAT improved by 4.0% at constant currency versus analyst expectations of 2.6%, according to StreetAccount. This is an acceleration from 2Q18 when total sales growth was flat at constant currency. H&M grew sales excluding VAT by 9.0% in reporting currency to SEK 55.8 billion, beating the consensus estimate of SEK 54.0 billion, according to StreetAccount. The company reported gradual progress in sales and market share thanks to its continuous efforts to improve its business. However, sales and cost development in some major markets, including the US, France, Italy and Belgium, were temporarily affected by issues while implementing new logistics systems during the spring, the company said. H&M implemented the new systems to improve its supply chain process and integrate store and online sales. H&M did not provide information on store numbers for this quarter unlike in previous trading update releases. In the second quarter, H&M reported 6.7% growth in total store numbers, to 4,801 stores. The company noted that the above sales figures are provisional and may deviate slightly from the full nine-month report it will publish on September 27, 2018.