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Key Takeaways
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Lamb Weston missed analysts’ expectations on the top and bottom lines with its fiscal fourth-quarter results.
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CEO Tom Werner said demand for frozen potatoes softened due to inflation.
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The company said it expects fiscal 2025 will “be another challenging year.”
Lamb Weston (LW) Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Tom Werner is “disappointed” by the company’s fiscal fourth-quarter results, which missed profit and revenue expectations, and issued a warning about 2025.
The purveyor of frozen potato products posted earnings per share (EPS) of $0.89, down 74% year-over-year, on revenue of $1.61 billion, below expectations of $1.27 and $1.7 billion, according to consensus estimates of analysts compiled by Visible Alpha.
“We are disappointed by our fourth-quarter performance,” Werner said. “Our price/mix results were below our expectations, while market share losses and a slowdown in restaurant traffic in the U.S. and many of our key international markets were greater than we expected.”
CEO Expects Fiscal 2025 Will ‘Be Another Challenging Year’
Werner isn’t optimistic about the coming year either.
“We expect fiscal 2025 to be another challenging year,” Werner said. “The operating environment has changed rapidly over the past 12 months as global restaurant traffic and frozen potato demand softened due to menu price inflation continuing to negatively affect global restaurant traffic.”
Lamb Weston expects net sales of $6.6 billion to $6.8 billion in fiscal 2025 and EPS of $4.35 to $4.85. Analysts polled by Visible Alpha are expecting $6.83 billion in revenue and $6.08 in EPS.
Shares of the company plunged 28% to $56.54 as of 1 p.m. ET Wednesday. They are down more than 47% in 2024.
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