Preview: Nestle: To fully deliver on guidance as eating-at-home tempers pandemic hit

Graubuendner Kantonalbank

17/02/2021 11:20

** Analysts expect Swiss food giant Nestle  NESN.S  to fully
deliver on its full-year organic sales growth guidance on
Thursday as they see high at-home food consumption in North
America and Europe to offset lower out-of-home consumption in
water and confectionery during the novel coronavirus pandemic
    ** They forecast a 3.4%-3.5% organic sale increase for 2020
vs company's outlook of about 3%  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL8N2HC0V1, and an
improvement on underlying trading operating profit margin to
17.8%-17.9%
    ** Zuercher Kantonalbank notes that Nestle's COVID-19 costs
were lower in H2 than in H1 while raw material costs were not
much higher, adding that it sees the results to confirm
company's excellent defensive qualities
    ** In addition, Vontobel expects a high-single-digit
free-cash-flow increase to allow the group to raise its dividend
    ** Brokers also expect Nestle to provide outlook for the
current year, seeing the company to reach organic sales growth
of 4% and more from 2021, and continue to improve margin
    ** Finally, analysts highlight Nestle's resilient portfolio
and strong performance, forecasting the company to emerge as one
of the winners of the pandemic
    

 ((elizaveta.gladun@thomsonreuters.com;
vladimir.sadykov@thomsonreuters.com))