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KT&G celebrates 100 straight quarters of profit
By Ko Dong-hwan
KT&G has recorded operating profit for the 100th consecutive quarter, with robust sales from cigarette products and electronic smoking devices worldwide.
According to the company's regulatory filing on Wednesday, KT&G has not missed a single quarter, as it has recorded an operating profit since the first quarter of 2000, when disclosing financial statements became mandatory in Korea.
Upon disclosing its performance from the fourth quarter of last year, KT&G said its sales in 2024 reached 5.91 trillion won ($4 billion), up 0.8 percent from the previous year, setting a new record high. Operating profit was 1.18 trillion won, up 1.5 percent from the previous year.
It is the first time in four years the company saw growth in both sales and operating profit.
The largest growth came from tobacco cigarette sales overseas, including in Indonesia. The company’s overseas sales stood at 1.45 trillion won, up 28 percent from the previous year.
The company’s robust performance overseas is in line with its ongoing expansion of control towers outside Korea. In December, the company upgraded its office in Uzbekistan to its Uzbek subsidiary and turned its office in charge of Mongolia and Europe into an official regional branch.
The company in the same month also completed construction of a manufacturing plant in Turkey and expects completion of additional global plants in Kazakhstan and Indonesia. The facilities will introduce new local value chains for KT&G, enabling it to produce, promote and distribute within local settings inside the company's overseas markets.
Following its latest public disclosure, KT&G set a goal this year of 5 percent year-on-year growth in revenue and 6 percent year-on-year growth in operating profit.
To improve shareholder value, the company said it will return at least 1.1 trillion won to shareholders by canceling its treasury shares worth 360 billion won, while buying back shares worth 300 billion won this year.
“Despite various uncertainties worldwide last year, we saw growth in both sales and operating profits,” a company official said. “This year, we look forward to boosting our market competitiveness and strengthening financial status so that we can return more to our shareholders.”