Shares in Kerry Group are trading up 2.5% today after the food and ingredients group recorded a 7.4% increase in earnings for 2024 and forecast earnings per share growth of 7-11% for the current year following the sale of its dairy division.

Kerry reported group EBITDA of €1,251m for its most recent financial year, with EBITDA from continuing operations increasing 6.9% to €1,188m.

The group brought in revenue of €8bn, including €6.9bn from its continuing Taste & Nutrition operations, with price reductions of 1.9% and a further 1.9% decline from disposals offsetting increased sales volumes (+3.3%).

The Dairy Ireland business, which is being sold to the Kerry Co-op, made revenues of €1.3bn and EBITDA of €63m last year.

Adjusted earnings per share of 467.5 cent reflected a 9.7% increase on a constant currency basis and 8.7% on a reported currency basis, while free cash flow of €766m represented 95% cash conversion.

Kerry has authorised a final dividend of 89 cent per share, ensuring shareholders receive a total dividend for 2024 of 127.1 cent, up 10.1% from 2023.

“We are pleased to report a strong performance across the year, with earnings per share growth of 9.7% reflecting continued volume progression in Taste & Nutrition and strong margin expansion across the business," said Edmond Scanlon, CEO of Kerry Group.

"Volume growth was led by strong performance in the Americas through foodservice innovations and increased nutritional renovation across a broad range of customers, while APMEA delivered a good performance given market conditions and Europe progressed through the year.

"We continued to strategically evolve our portfolio, including further developing our Biotechnology Solutions capability and the significant divestment of Kerry Dairy Ireland, which resulted in Kerry becoming a pure-play taste and nutrition company.

"As we look to 2025, Kerry remains strongly positioned for good market outperformance due to our unique positioning with our customers as an innovation and renovation partner.

"We expect to deliver good volume growth and strong margin expansion, resulting in constant currency adjusted earnings per share growth of 7% to 11%, after the dilution from the Kerry Dairy Ireland disposal.”

Kerry said a number of its markets remained "subdued" in what was "a more normalised year relative to recent history," with product innovation geared more towards existing products and addressing consumer demands.

The group said Taste & Nutrition "delivered a good year of volume growth," significantly outperforming the food and beverage end markets, while sales volumes in foodservice rose 6.8%.

Regionally, sales increased most quickly in the Americas (+4.1% or €3,764m), with good growth in Latin America, and the APMEA region (+4.8%), but sales were down marginally (-0.1% to €1,455m) in Europe.

During the year, the Kerry board approved two share buyback programmes totalling €600m, adding to the €300m share buyback programme launched in November.

The group acquired nearly 6.8m shares at a cost of €556.5m last year, and has purchased a further 458,271 shares at €43.3m since the start of the month.

Kerry has also said it is targeting annual growth in volume of 4-6% and EBITDA margin of 18-19% to the end of 2026, and it has set new targets of 19-20% in EBITDA margin and "high single-digit" earnings per share growth for 2028.

Photo: Edmond Scanlon, CEO of Kerry Group. (Pic: Supplied)