P&G warns of bigger earnings hit from commodity, freight costs By Reuters

(Reuters) – Procter & Gamble (NYSE:) Co on Tuesday warned that higher commodity and freight costs would take a bigger bite out of earnings, but kept its full-year forecasts intact, banking on higher prices and resilient demand for personal care products.

The Tide detergent maker’s shares fell 1.4% to $140.32 in premarket trading.

The company said it now expects a hit of about $2.3 billion from commodity and freight expenses this fiscal year, compared with a prior forecast of about $1.9 billion, as the stop-and-start nature of the pandemic, worker shortages and clogged shipping ports affect global supply chains.

P&G faced significant input costs across most of its commodity basket, including expenses related to pulp, resin and polypropylene.

Peers Unilever (NYSE:), which is due to report results on Thursday and Reckitt Benckiser Group, have warned that their profit margins will be squeezed this year.

Price hikes due to rising costs and an increase in demand for personal care products spurred by people returning to social events helped boost P&G’s sales by 5% to $20.34 billion in the first quarter.

Analysts had expected sales of $19.91 billion, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.

The company’s organic sales rose 4% in the quarter, while volume sales rose 2%.

Net income attributable to P&G fell 4% to $4.11 billion, or $1.61 per share, beating estimates of $1.59 per share.

The Gillette maker said it expects higher commodity and freight costs to shave 90 cents from its full-year earnings per share, compared with a previous forecast of a hit of 70 cents.

However, the company maintained its outlook for annual core earnings per share growth of 3% to 6%.