Jinwu Financial News | Blue Moon (06993) announced that for the year ended December 31, 2023, profit attributable to the company's equity holders recorded a year-on-year decrease of 46.79% (HK$). The basic profit per share was 5.84 cents, and the board of directors recommended an annual dividend of 6.0 cents per share.
During the period, revenue was recorded at $7.324 billion, down 7.88% year on year and about 2.9% year on year in RMB terms. This slight decrease was mainly due to a decrease in sales to offline distributors and direct sales to major customers, which was partially offset by an increase in sales through online channels. The Group's earnings for the second half of 2023 recorded a 4.5% increase compared to the second half of 2022. This growth was mainly due to the strong performance of emerging online channels and the recovery of offline distributors.
By product category, the sales revenue of clothing cleaning and care products recorded 6.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of about 4.7%. Due to the devaluation of RMB in 2023, sales in RMB remained stable for the year ended 31 December 2022. Sales of personal cleaning products and household cleaning and care products decreased by 27.8% and 25.8%, respectively, mainly due to the decline in demand for disinfection products after the pandemic.
By channel, the Group's online channel sales in RMB increased 6.7% year over year. The slight increase in sales through online channels was mainly due to the strong sales performance of the Group's emerging online channels, offset by the depreciation of the RMB against the Hong Kong dollar; sales through offline distributors decreased by about 15.3% year over year due to the normalization of inventory levels for such customers after the pandemic; and the Group's sales to major customers fell by about 18.5% year over year, mainly due to reducing sales to certain customers with deferred payments to optimize trade receivables balances and reduce risk bearing.
Gross profit was recorded at $4.54 billion, down 1.20% year on year. The gross margin was 62%, an increase of 4.2 percentage points over the previous year.