ANTA Sports Products Limited, a sportswear company in China, announced its audited annual results for the year ended 31st December 2020.
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Despite the impact of the pandemic, the Group’s revenue, gross profit and profit from operations all recorded positive growth, reaching a new record high since listing.
During the financial year, revenue increased by 4.7% to US$5.4 billion and the overall gross profit margin increased 3.2 percentage points to 58.2%. The overall profit from operations increased by 5.3% to US$1.4 billion;
Aiming for healthy inventory level and retail discount, ANTA segment achieved revenue of US$2.4 billion; revenue from FILA segment increased by 18.1% to US$2.6 billion, demonstrating its capability in sustainable development. The new brand incubation model became more mature, and all other brands’ revenue increased by 35.4% to US$351.8 million.
Operating profit margin increased 0.2 percentage points to 25.8%, achieving record high. It implied the Group’s success in retail strategy, high efficiency in cost control and a matured multi-brand business model.
Although the overseas markets were full of uncertainty amid the Pandemic, AS Holding, the Group’s joint venture which wholly-owned Amer Sports, still shared a profit of US$18 million in the second half of 2020.
Without the effect of share of loss of a joint venture, the profit attributable to equity shareholders decreased by 3.6% to US$887.1 million. On a consolidated basis, with the effect of share of loss of a joint venture, the profit attributable to equity shareholders decreased by 3.4% to US$795.4 million. After deducting the foreign exchange loss of US$52 million, the profit attributable to shareholders increased by 2.9%.
The final dividend was US$6 cents per ordinary share and the dividend payout ratio was 30.3% of the profit attributable to equity shareholders during the financial year. The Group was still able to maintain a stable dividend payout ratio.
The Group still recorded a healthy liquidity and sufficient cash level, showing its risk resistant capacity. For the year ended 31st December 2020, net operating cash inflow slightly decreased by 0.4% to US$1.1 billion, exceeding the profit for the year (without the effect of share of loss of a joint venture). Free cash inflow also reached US$1 billion, up US$30.6 million year-on-year. Total amount of cash and cash equivalents, fixed deposits held at banks with maturity over three months and pledged deposits reached US$3.1 billion, reflecting the healthy cash generation capability of the Group amid the Pandemic.
The total number of ANTA stores (including ANTA KIDS standalone stores) in Mainland China and foreign countries stood at 9,922. The total number of FILA stores (including FILA KIDS and FILA FUSION standalone stores) in Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macao and Singapore stood at 2,006. The total number of DESCENTE stores in Mainland China and Hong Kong stood at 175. The total number of KOLON SPORT stores in Mainland China and Hong Kong stood at 157. The sales network of the Group continued to improve, helping to expand its brand awareness and promoting the Group’s sustainable development.
As a leading sportswear brand in China, ANTA has always been committed to providing the mass market with functional, “Value-for-money” sportswear products across a diverse range of sporting categories, from popular sports to professional and niche sports, including running, cross-training, basketball, etc. ANTA’s brand position has evolved from “Value-for-money” to “Extreme Value”.
ANTA continued to support for Chinese athletes including Wu Dajing, Zhang Jike, Eileen Gu, etc., and invited them to become ANTA’s endorsers. As the official sportswear partner of the COC, ANTA sponsored 22 Chinese national teams in winter sports, boxing, taekwondo, gymnastics, weightlifting, wrestling, etc.
ANTA launched a licensed collection of national flag-themed sportswear for the Beijing 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games with the Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee in Shanghai. This series of products attracted many first-time customers for ANTA. “ANTA Running” launched its long-term strategy “Born from Runners, Evolving with Runners”, echoing the trend seen over the past few years among the general public which was a desire for a sporty, healthier lifestyle.
ANTA KIDS enjoyed the advantage of being an “Early-entry Trailblazer”. The brand consistently promoted its philosophy of “Grow Up with Fun” and has been aiming to incorporate more of a “Fun” element in the kids’ growing journey through an integrated experience. The famous mixed-race child model, Ella Gross, officially became the new generation of ANTA KIDS’ endorsers, along with Zhang Yuexuan (Tian Tian) and Fu Tianzong, the champion of World Young Street Dance Championship. They continued to encourage children to release their “Fun” energy and lead the future.
FILA is positioned as a high-end sports fashion brand that, together with FILA KIDS and FILA FUSION, targets high-end customers from different age group. FILA KIDS and FILA FUSION enables FILA to become a brand that every member in a family can buy. FILA invited top celebrities to be endorsers, including Gao Yuanyuan, Huang Jingyu, Wu Jinyan, Kōki, as well as Cai Xukun, who joined the brand during the financial year. They not only drove sales of products, but also enhanced brand awareness.
FILA retained its competitiveness on the back of the efforts of its worldwide design team in Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, etc. The presence of FILA apparel business in China has increased gradually, it is seen a growing popularity of the shoes products in FILA among customers. During the financial year, over 10 million pairs of shoe products were sold, it is confident to say that its footwear products will become one of the growth driver in the future.
With over 80 years of brand history, as well as the design driven sports spirit of “Design that Moves”. DESCENTE combined innovative technology with design aesthetics, swiftly established its functional and professional image in China by utilizing quality materials which formulated the brand’s DNA.
DESCENTE will continue to actively expand its retail presence in China’s high-end sportswear market. It cooperated with internationally renowned movie star Daniel Wu, famous Chinese actress Xin Zhilei, and golf athlete Li Haotong, to promote various series. DESCENTE also opened DESCENTE BLANC concept store in Beijing – the first concept store of the brand in China.
KOLON SPORT has been promoting the development of an outdoor lifestyle and became a premium outdoor lifestyle brand. During the financial year, KOLON SPORT announced that Chen Kun, a renowned Chinese actor, has become the brand endorser. They worked together to interpret the high-end outdoor lifestyle of “YOUR BEST WAY TO NATURE”.
As a leader in global sportswear industry, ANTA Sports continued to strive for the target of becoming a respectable world-class, multi-brand sportswear group. The successful implementation of “Single-focus, Multi-brand, Omni-channel” strategy has built a solid foundation of the business. During the financial year, ANTA Sports optimized the multi-brand portfolio to form Three Growth Curves. In 2021, the group will continue to unlock the potentials in Three Growth Curves to facilitate multi-layer business growth incentives.
Investment increased in Direct to Consumer model for ANTA. The group have optimized resources through the dimensions of “Customers, Products and Channels”, which compiles a more effective information flow that connects production to the consumers in the value chain, allowing us to be more sensitive to the changes in demand and produce high-quality products meeting customer needs.
ANTA emphasized the digitized transformation, highly focusing on the improvement of membership value, the intelligent upgrade of products, the upgrading of ANTA’s official website, aiming at the penetration of online and offline sales channels to support internationalized technological mid-office, in order to enhance the integrated working efficiency.
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Mr. Ding Shizhong, Chairman and CEO of ANTA Sports, said, “As a leader in the global sportswear industry, ANTA Sports firmly upholds the philosophy of long-termism, the perseverance to our mission and vision, the focus on ‘Consumer-oriented’ strategy, the delivery of ‘High-quality Growth’ and the culture of ‘Benchmarking with High Standards’, to become a respectable world-class, multi-brand sportswear group. The year 2021 is the 30th anniversary of ANTA Sports. The mission, vision, core capabilities, and what kind of social responsibilities should be undertaken in the future are the questions we need to ask and answer for the 30th anniversary. Motivating the Company to move towards the goal of sustainable development will be our directions in the next 10, 20 years and even longer term.”