Adidas warns of falling gross sales in North America because it continues to unload Yeezy stock

Adidas on Wednesday warned of a gross sales decline in its overstocked North American market in 2024, because the German sportswear model continues to unload its remaining Yeezy stock.

Forex-neutral gross sales in North America are anticipated to say no to a mid-single-digit fee in 2024, however are projected to notch mid-single-digit development worldwide regardless of persistent “macroeconomic challenges and geopolitical tensions,” the corporate stated.

Adidas confirmed its 2023 working revenue got here in at 268 million euros ($292.9 million) on the again of flat currency-neutral gross sales, considerably above prior expectations as the corporate continues to take a success from the cessation of its line of Yeezy — footwear the retailer produced in a collaboration with American rapper Ye, previously referred to as Kanye West.

For the fourth quarter, the corporate posted an working lack of 377 million euros. The board proposed a flat dividend of 0.70 euros per share.

“Although by far not good enough, 2023 ended better than what I had expected at the beginning of the year,” CEO Bjørn Gulden stated in a press release.

“Despite losing a lot of Yeezy revenue and a very conservative sell-in strategy, we managed to have flat revenues. We expected to have a substantial negative operating result, but achieved an operating profit of €268 million.”

Adidas was confirming preliminary results released in late January, when it introduced that it might not write off nearly all of its Yeezy stock and would as a substitute unload the remaining footwear at price.

The sportswear big was pressured to axe the Yeezy line after terminating its partnership with Ye over a string of anti-Semitic remarks that the rapper made in 2022.

Adidas stated the discontinuation of Yeezy represented a drag of round 500 million euros within the year-on-year comparability by 2023, although the sale of elements of the remaining stock within the second and third quarter positively impacted internet gross sales by round 750 million euros.

“With a very disciplined go-to-market and buying process, we reduced our inventories by almost €1.5 billion. With the exception of the U.S., we now have healthy inventories everywhere,” Gulden stated.

He added that the corporate is anticipating some development within the first quarter of 2024 and an extra pick-up within the second half of the 12 months.

“We still have a lot of work to do, but I feel very confident we are on the right track. We will bring adidas back again. Give us some time and we will again say – we got this!” he stated.

Adidas projected an working revenue of round 500 million euros in 2024, with unfavorable foreign money results anticipated to “weigh significantly on the company’s profitability” due to hostile impacts on each reported revenues and gross margin growth.

Adidas shares fell 1.5% in early commerce on Wednesday.