Good morning. At our year-end results for fiscal 2023, I guided that we expected to see sequential improvement in our business results in the current fiscal year. At the group level, we are seeing slower than expected growth, and we no longer are expecting fiscal 2024 half one to be stronger than fiscal 2023, half two. This is due to a materially weaker performance outlook in Latin America, which makes up nearly 11% of Diageo's net sales value. Importantly, we have momentum continuing in four out of our five regions, including seeing sequential improvement in our largest region of North America.
So what are we seeing in Latin America? Well, LAC is now expected to decline organic net sales by more than 20% year-over-year in the first half of fiscal 2024. If you remember, we disclosed back in August that we ended fiscal 2023 with higher than expected inventory levels as economic activity had slowed post our shipments for World Cup. But we are now seeing two additional headwinds in the region. First, consumer conditions have worsened. Macroeconomic pressure in the region is resulting in lower consumption for the category and consumer downtrading.
Second, due to higher interest rates and inflation, we are seeing customers destocking. Both of these impacts are slowing down progress in reducing channel inventory to appropriate levels for the current environment. It's important to note that despite the slowing category growth, our business in LAC continues to win share in most markets within the categories we participate in. If you remember, this business grew 20% in the first half of last year, and so we are lapping extremely high comps.
For the impact at the group level, what this means is we now expect organic operating profit growth for the first half of fiscal 2024 to decline compared to the first half of fiscal 2023, primarily due to LAC's declining net sales, increased trade investment, lower operating leverage, and adverse mix resulting from downtrading. Across other regions, we expect to continue to invest additional A&P ahead of net sales. We expect that there will be continued, albeit moderating, cost inflation, which will be partially offset by pricing actions.
Looking ahead to the second half of fiscal 2024 at the group level, we expect to see a gradual improvement in organic net sales and organic operating profit growth from the first half of fiscal 2024, while we continue to invest in marketing and in the business to drive long-term sustainable growth.
I recognize the magnitude of this issue, and we are putting together the right actions to manage it. We will come back to you at our interim results in January 2024, to give details on actions being taken. Most importantly, the rest of the regions, which is 90% of our portfolio, are on the right trajectory. As for the other regions, we are seeing strong momentum in APAC, despite the slower recovery in China. While our Baijiu business is proving to be more resilient, we're seeing less momentum than we expected on the international spirits business, which is true also for the industry in general.
In Europe, we still see momentum, albeit slower than in the second half of fiscal 2023. With geopolitical tensions escalating in the region, trading has unfortunately stopped in key geographies in the Middle East, where we hold leading positions in spirits, and this has reduced some of the momentum of the region. As we said at the end of the year, globally, we still expect to see growth and gradual improvement through fiscal 2024. While we see green shoots, we also continue to experience volatility, and the operating environment is likely to remain challenging.
These are, however, short-term challenges, and we run the business for the long term. We will continue to invest in the business, as I'm confident in the long-term sustainable growth for our portfolio. All of us at Diageo have huge confidence in the medium to long-term attractiveness of our industry and category.
We believe in the solid business we have built over the years, the consistent investment we have made in it, and we have the talent, tools, and capabilities to drive sustainable growth. So now on to our medium-term guidance. Moving forward, we expect to deliver organic net sales growth between 5% and 7%. This is ahead of what we were growing pre-COVID. Our confidence in this guidance is underpinned by three things. First, our participation in the attractive segment of International Spirits, which is growing ahead of Total Beverage Alcohol, sourcing from Beer and Wine occasions.
Second, our advantaged portfolio and footprint, which enables us to grow ahead of Spirits. And third, the investments we will continue to make to grow share. Given our share ambition, we will continue to invest behind our brands.
As for operating profit, we expect to grow broadly in line with organic net sales growth in the medium term, driven by the investments we will make to further strengthen the business as the industry normalizes from the growth super cycle and driven by continued higher inflation. Over time, as inflation moderates and productivity from our Supply Agility Program flows through, we expect operating profit to grow ahead of organic sales growth. So that's what I have in my prepared remarks this morning. I think we can open it up for Q&A.
Of course. As a reminder, if you would like to ask a question today, please press star followed by one on your telephone keypad now to enter the queue. When preparing to ask your question, please ensure you are unmuted locally. That's star one to ask a question today. And the first question comes from Laurence Whyatt from Barclays. Laurence, please go ahead. Your line is open.
Morning. Thanks very much for the question. Three from me, if that's okay. Just in terms of the medium-term guide coming out of, you got the 5%-7% top line and then the organic profit in line in the medium term, but you also mentioned, over the longer term, you do expect that to improve.
Could you give any sort of time frame on that? Are we looking sort of one or two years of limited margin expansion and maybe expansion in a couple of years? Or is that simply due to the inflation levels, and as we expect inflation to drop to a more normal, say, 2%-3% globally, that's when we'd start to expect the margin expansion to take place? Secondly, I was wondering if you could just talk us through really exactly what happened in October. Of course, you made your AGM statement back in September, where presumably things were performing a bit better.
But clearly something happened in October, and I was wondering if you could just sort of run us through precisely what that was. And then finally, on LATAM, within that region, are there any specific countries that you'd call out, that are performing better or worse, than some of the others? Thank you very much.
Thanks. I'll take your second question about October, and then I'll let Lavanya talk about the medium-term guidance a little bit further.
So what's happened since the AGM? I mean, really three things have happened. One, of course, we knew about and disclosed and knew would be challenging, which is, you know, we did end the year with higher, you know, inventory levels. But the team really did expect. Within the region, the team really expected to be able to move through that within the first quarter of our fiscal. So really did expect October to be a key month for, you know, coming back to regular ordering. Two additional things have happened that really have worsened the consumer environment.
We talked a little bit about that in the call in August about what had led originally to that inventory build, particularly in Brazil. But you know, conditions have really worsened. Things like U.S. interest rates do impact Latin America quite immediately, as well as you know, elections in several key markets. All of this it really has created a very tough consumer environment, seeing more down trading caused us to have to spend a fair amount of trade spend on pricing in order to move that inventory. In addition, while we have good visibility in inventory levels through our distributors, we have less visibility to inventory at wholesaler and retailers that they sell to.
You know, Latin America is one where our point of sale information, you know, is just much more limited. So if you remember, we've had to take multiple rounds of pricing throughout fiscal, you know, really the last two fiscals. And in an environment of benign interest rates, these channels, you know, purchased ahead, clearly, of anticipated consumption. You also have to recognize that many of these markets, our products are often viewed as a hedge against devaluation.
We do have a very experienced team in Latin America, and in a more stable environment, you can see where these customers, you know, do these pre-buys. Unfortunately, in the environment of this extreme volatility and coming through that COVID super cycle, it was just difficult to see what part of what was going on was true consumption growth versus inventory increases.
It became very clear to the team as they were working through October orders that clearly there was more inventory below that, you know, kind of in those more opaque layers underneath our direct distributors that we did not anticipate. As far as for what, you know, for where this is, where we are performing kind of better and/or worse, you know, I mentioned that we were, we were gaining share in most of our markets in Latin America. The one exception to that is Mexico. Certainly Mexico is a place that we are, you know, seeing, you know, kind of the most challenges right now in our business.
But we are seeing, you know, really pressure kind of throughout the region, I would say. But we are gaining share in those other markets. And then, Lavanya, I'll let you take the medium-term guidance. And of course, for those of us, for those of you that are joining us for Capital Markets Day, next week, we'll go much deeper into this. But Lavanya?
Thank you, Debra. Hi, Laurence. So, I'd say three things. The first one is, I do want to reiterate that we do feel good about the strength of this business and the resilience of the business and the long-term outlook of the business. So in terms of, you know, how we frame, we will want to continue to invest in this business, to continue to drive growth. You've heard us say many times that we are only a 4.7% market share of total beverage alcohol, and our ambition to get to a 6% market share is very much strong.
Second, we are continuing to see inflation that although it has slowed, it continues to be there, and so that is influencing our guidance on operating profit. Third, we will accelerate productivity as we go through the next several years. You've heard me talk about our Supply Agility Program and the expectations that we have, that it will help build resilience for our supply chain, deliver incremental operating you know profit, as well as help from a cash and a carbon perspective.
So this is a program that as the benefits of this start to come through, it will help from an operating profit perspective as well. I'm not putting a timeframe specifically around this, simply because of the uncertainty that exists in the marketplace today. So as we do see inflation moderate, and as we see the benefits of our accelerated productivity come through, we do expect that despite increasing investment behind our business, we will see operating margin improvement.
Thanks very much. And just coming back to, Debra, your comment on Mexico. Do you think that's specifically a spirits comment, or do you think that's an overall consumer comment?
Well, that would be like overall consumer, but certainly spirits have been impacted more than beer.
Great, thank you very much.
The next question comes from Edward Mundy, from Jefferies. Edward, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hi. Hi, Debra. Hi, Lavanya. Two questions for me, please. The first is, you're talking to improvement, I think, in the second half of 2024. Does that mean growth in both revenues and profits for the second half of 2024? Just to help us calibrate our fiscal 2024 numbers. And then second of all, on the sort of medium-term framework of five to seven, you know, clearly we've been through this, you know, super cycle.
You do operate in a, in a, in a particularly good industry, and you do have a great footprint and great portfolio. I guess the question is, you know, why not bring this back down to four to six, which is where the guidance was, you know, before? And why have you stuck with the five to seven?
So Lavanya, you wanna.
Take the first one.
So, yes, why don't you take the first one, and then.
Yes. So, in terms of our guidance for this fiscal year, what we are guiding to is that we will see gradual improvement in both organic net sales and operating profit in the second half of fiscal 2024, compared to the first half of fiscal 2024. So that's what we're guiding to. And then.
Yeah, as far as why not go back to four to six, and, I mean, this is something we certainly will dive, you know, more into. But, you know, look, from an industry we are, y ou know, it is an attractive industry, and we have a great advantage, portfolio and footprint, that we expect to grow ahead of that, you know, industry growth.
So, you know, we are seeing the industry get back to those mid s- you know, that, that mid-single digit. We do feel very confident in our footprint, and we are investing against that. So, you know, those are really the, you know, the three components. And, it, you know, as I mentioned, we can, we can certainly talk a lot more about that next week.
The next question comes from Andrea Pistacchi, from Bank of America. Andrea, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Yes, hi. Thank you. Two from me, please. One on the U.S. So at your full year results, which you then sort of confirmed at the AGM on the U.S., I think the message was that the market is growing around the low end of mid-single digit. Maybe because of a couple of things like prepared cocktails, et cetera, you're growing a bit below that now. And then in H1, you've also got some more difficult comps. So has anything really changed on the U.S.? And I think in the press release, your comment on the U.S. is that on North America, you expect gradual improvement in organic net sales growth in the first half.
Does this suggest that you're actually expecting some growth in North America in the first half? And then the second question, please, slightly broader, but again, focus on U.S. and Europe, is about pricing. So in this 1H, you're benefiting from price increases that you put through, mainly at the beginning of the year. So how are you feeling about pricing over the next 12 months in the more difficult consumer environment? And what are you seeing in the U.S. in terms of pricing environment?
There's been some commentary, for example, on the in Cognac. Obviously, you're not directly exposed to that, but Cognac being very competitive, is that specific to that category, or are you seeing anything slightly broader? Thank you.
I'll take the first one, and then, Lavanya, if you wanna take the second one.
Yes.
You know, look, all we're saying at this point from a North America perspective is that we are expecting sequential improvement from the second half of last fiscal. You know, clearly, right now is an important time for you know the industry as you. You know, this is a high seasonal business, so you know, certainly it's underway, but we are expecting sequential improvement.
And then.
Yeah.
I'd just add, you know, from a pricing perspective, we're definitely seeing the rate of price increases that were being taken, both within our business, but more broadly within the industry, and even more broadly within consumer products, is moderating, as time has gone by.
And so what we are seeing on pricing is, you know, we have the right, we have a great suite of tools and data and capabilities to be able to analyze and understand where there is pricing opportunity and where we, you know, what's the right, you know, kind of the equation between trade spend, headline pricing, to be able to get to the right equation between volume, price, and mix. And so what we're seeing right now is moderation in pricing.
There is definitely, in some parts of the world, there is definitely more pressure, such as in Latin America, where we are seeing some down trading. But broadly speaking, I would say that this industry in general doesn't have an environment where there is dramatic changes in the pricing environment. So if we find at any point in time that we are slightly out of kilter on price, we will make the adjustments, but those will happen in both directions.
Question comes from Simon Hales, from Citi. Simon, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Thanks. Hi, Debra. Hi, Lavanya. So two for me, please. Can I just come back to the destock issue? I mean, I think over the last sort of decade at Diageo, you've clearly been focused on, you know, sort of sell out, not sell in, you know, as a strategy. And I think we were of the view that the destock cycles that we've seen historically would be less of an issue, sort of going forward when we saw macro weakness.
But from what you're saying today, Debra, it feels that outside of a lot of your maybe your Tier 1 wholesalers, you're perhaps still struggling in some markets to still see, you know, the inventory levels we might see in trade. So I just wonder, you know, is that fair?
Is that harsh, you know, against that backdrop? And how do we think about your visibility now on how much more stock levels you really think are left in LAC in Latin America? Do you think the destock will be done by the end of the first half? So a bit of a broad, waffly first question. And then secondly, if I can just ask you about Europe a little bit. You flagged the weakening in the Middle East having some impact on the division of late. Are you also seeing a bit of a slowdown from a broader consumer standpoint across Western Europe yet? Some of the other FMCGs have been calling that out in recent weeks. I wonder if you've seen it.
Yeah, I'll, you know, I'll start with Europe, and then, I don't know, Lavanya.
I think.
If you want to take the destock.
Yeah.
So, you know, look, I mean, in Europe, we still have, you know, strong momentum, I would say. It's just, certainly since the, you know, the tensions, you know, have escalated in the Middle East, we, you know, we definitely are seeing a more cautious consumer. So, you know, that's a few weeks. You know, overall, we still feel good about our momentum in Europe. We are gaining share, so, you know, that certainly helps us.
But it's, you know, I would say it's just been a little tempered, certainly, in the, you know, in the last few weeks. And of course, we are a leading spirit company within actually, you know, the Middle East. We, we have, in effect, stopped trading. So, certainly there has been an impact there, and that rolls into our Europe numbers.
So, Simon, yeah, your question on the destock. We are indeed a sellout culture, and we have very strong controls around the reporting of this and the tracking of inventory levels at our direct customers. What has happened in Latin America is, you know, while we have good visibility of the inventory levels at our distributors, we have less visibility to the inventory levels at the wholesalers and the retailers that they sell to. And as Debra mentioned, you know, over the last two fiscals, we've taken multiple rounds of pricing, and this was, you know, at least in the beginning of these price increases, it was in an environment of very benign interest rates.
What we believe has happened is that this part of the channel that's below the distributors, they have purchased ahead of consumption. You know, it is hard to see, as Debra mentioned, how much of this was actual consumption versus how much of this was inventory increases in these layers. But in terms of our own visibility to distributor inventory levels, those are strong. We have regular reporting about it. This is, you've heard me talk about this. This is a part of our routine, you know, financial assurance committee process, and so we definitely continue to be a sellout culture.
The next question comes from Mitch Collett, from Deutsche Bank. Mitch, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Morning, Debra. Morning, Lavanya. I'd love to ask again about the US. So you've said that you expect a sequential improvement versus 2H. I guess that means better than -2.6 in terms of organic sales growth for both 1H 2024 and full year 2024. Can you perhaps give some color on why it's going to improve versus the second half of 2023? The industry data certainly seems to have got worse, and Tequila growth, specifically for you, seems to have slowed. That's my first question. And then secondly, can you talk about the time period, more specifically for the medium-term guidance?
I'm guessing, given what you've said about 1H, FY 2024 won't be within the range, but does the medium-term guidance start in FY 2025? Do you think FY 2025, appreciate it's a long way away, is likely to be within your medium-term guidance? Thank you.
Yeah. So I'll start with your second question. I mean, the medium-term guidance is, it's medium-term guidance. We don't have a specific time frame that we're assigning to that. Your other question about the U.S. So, I mean, you know, we are in the middle of the half, but we are still expecting sequential improvement. And, you know, we're seeing actually some green shoots and, you know, in many parts of the industry. You know, I know that there's been a lot of reporting, you know, from other competitors and other things, and, you know, it is a market that's quite volatile right now, but we are in a critical period, and we still expect sequential improvement.
Hey, on your question on medium-term guidance, yes, I think it is safe to say that fiscal 2024 is not going to be within our medium-term guidance. And in terms of, you know, when does medium-term guidance come into place? Look, I think we need to look at this medium-term guidance from a perspective of that is what we expect to structurally be able to grow, right?
And this, and that is anchored in the fact that our medium-term guidance, the confidence comes from the fact that we, you know, TBA continues to be an attractive category. International spirits within TBA is growing faster than the rest of the category. Our footprint is clearly advantaged in terms of the geographies and the brand portfolio that we have across this business.
We are investing behind the business, and we will continue to expect to pursue our ambition of growing share in this business. You know, uncertainty exists in the near term, but I do expect that, you know, over the medium term, we will be able to deliver between 5% and 7% growth on the top line.
The next question comes from Cédric Lecasble from Stifel. Cedric, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Yes, thank you very much. Good morning. Most of the questions have been answered. I have one remaining. If you had to quantify the impact of LATAM in this morning's communication and change in tone, would you say LATAM is 50% of the move, 70% of the move? We understand that there are some other moving parts hurting the business or making it a little more challenging in the short term. So what would be the weight, the precise weight of LATAM in your change of view this morning? Thank you very much.
Thanks. Lavanya?
Yes. So, Cédric, what we have said in our RNS is that, you know, We've issued this guidance because of the change in outlook in Latin America. You know, and to just to reiterate what's in the guidance, we are seeing sequential improvement in our biggest and most, probably the most important market for this business in North America. We're seeing sequential improvement in Africa. We are seeing strong momentum in Europe and in APAC, and, in APAC, despite the slower than expected recovery in China. Latin America is about 11% of our business.
This was, as of the end of fiscal 2023. As we have said in our press release, this business has, it's now expected to decline, above 20%. I mean, you can do the math in terms of, you know, the percentage of impact that we are seeing from the Latin America business.
The next question comes from Chris Pitcher, from Redburn Atlantic. Chris, your line is open. Please go ahead.
Hi, good morning, Debra, Lavanya. Can I dig into Latin America again? Sorry to come back, but over the years, you guys had theoretically moved your business away from the sort of free trade zones, the use of wholesalers, and there was a big focus on the domestic business and having greater visibility. You also invested significantly in your primary scotches, which were meant to soften any economic impact.
And yet, looking at the numbers today, this is not just bad, but almost as bad as what happened in COVID, when it was a supply restriction. This is nothing like the sort of decline we've seen in previous economic cycles. So are you comfortable that the work that was done in Latin America really worked and reduced the cyclicality?
Or is there a major overhaul of your reporting and route-to-market structure that needs to happen in order to avoid something of this magnitude? And then secondly, on the medium-term guidance, I appreciate that five to seven reflects the structural growth of your business, but it doesn't reflect the cyclicality. Your main competitor has a wider range. Have you considered widening the range just to better reflect the reality of operating in a more cyclical distilled spirits market? Thanks.
So I'll take the first one. I mean, just on Latin America in general, I mean, our business has grown. Over the last four years, we still are looking at a you know a 15% CAGR. So, and it continues to be margin accretive to the growth, to the group, importantly. So, you know, our business overall, we feel very good about what we have built in Latin America over the past several years, and that business has premiumized. It is, of course, though, still an emerging market. And in emerging markets, you know, it's never, it's never a straight line, and certainly, there is volatility.
And as we've premiumized, you know, clearly with this consumer environment, with down trading, we have had to invest against price as well. So we're not only suffering from the decline, but we're also suffering from having to, you know, move through the inventory. We're having to spend a fair amount in trade. But still overall, and in the long run, we feel good about what we are building, and have built in Latin America. You know, but we did have to come out this morning with this announcement because we were no longer seeing the sequential improvement at the group level.
You know, this has caused us to no longer see at the group level that sequential improvement that we had previously guided to. So, you know, per our regulatory requirements, we absolutely wanted to get out, you know, to the market as soon as was appropriate. And, you know, so that's what's happened in Latin America. Overall, in the long run, kind of scope of the business, we still feel very good about what we've built there. Lavanya, you want to say anything about.
Yes.
Medium term?
Chris, just to clarify, what do you mean by when you use the word cyclical? Chris, are you there? Okay, so I'm just going to, I'm gonna get put, because you may have been using the word cyclical. What I will say about this business is that it is our, our business, our portfolio, is that it is extremely resilient. And you will see more of this next week, during our Capital Markets Day. And so I don't want to steal all of the thunder of next week. But one of the things that you will see next week in our Capital Markets Day is we have a very broad portfolio. Our presence in this category spans across every type of international spirit.
So, you know, Scotch is a big part of our business, but also, you know, we have a strong presence in premium beer with Guinness in Europe and North America. We have a great portfolio within Tequila, within Gin, within Rum. I can go on. And we also have a deep portfolio from a price point perspective. And so our presence across geographies, because not every geography moves in the same direction from an economic, macroeconomic perspective. And so one of the things that it really works for Diageo is this breadth of portfolio and footprint that we have, which is what gives us real resilience.
You know, depending on what's happening with the consumer, in terms of what type of service they're more interested in, or depending on what's happening from a macroeconomic perspective, this, this category, our portfolio within this category really is very resilient. And so that's what gives us the confidence in our medium-term guidance. Yeah, I guess more on that next week.
Yes, thanks. You know, we're at time, so just I wanted to thank you for joining us this morning on this call. For those of you who we will be seeing next week, we look forward to it. And for those not, I think it is gonna be webcast, so you'll be able to see it as well. Thank you very much.