Hasbro ( NASDAQ: HAS ) came up short of already tempered earnings expectations on Thursday.
For the fourth quarter, $1.21 in earnings per share missed expectations by $0.08 while a 16.4% drop in revenue year over year misses by $0.08.narrowly exceeded estimates. The mixed result comes despite a pre-announcement in late January that dampened expectations.
“As we announced previously, our fourth quarter and full-year 2022 results came in below our expectations,” CEO Chris Cocks said. “Despite this, we delivered our first billion-dollar brand in MAGIC: THE GATHERING and another record year at Wizards of the Coast and Digital Gaming, we grew key investment areas including licensing and direct to consumer, and we improved adjusted operating profit margin.”
A 26% slide in sales for the toy-focused consumer products segment more than offset a 22% jump in revenue from the smaller, card-game-driven Wizards of the Coast segment. Management said that lower sales, close outs, and higher warehousing costs due to higher inventory levels hampered performance.
“For 2023, we have a focused plan to grow share in our key categories and further improve our margins,” Cocks concluded. “We are capitalizing on a fantastic entertainment slate, including Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves in March and exciting new product launches, while facing a challenging consumer discretionary environment and approximately $300M in revenue headwinds from exited licenses, brands and markets as well as foreign exchange.”
Management expects revenue down low-single digits for the full-year while operating profit margin is expected to expand by about 50 to 70 basis points. Analysts had anticipated modest revenue growth to $5.98B from $5.86B in 2022. An adjusted earnings per diluted share guide in the range of $4.45 to $4.55 also fell short of the consensus of $4.88.
Shares of the Pawtucket-based toy purveyor edged 0.7% lower in premarket trading on Thursday.
Dig into the details of the results .
For further details see:
Hasbro posts mixed earnings as holiday toy sales slump