Americana Restaurants sees seasonal shift, currency changes take bite off Q1-2023 profit

Americana Restaurants sees seasonal shift, currency changes take bite off Q1-2023 profit

Dubai: The Middle East’s biggest restaurant operator, Americana, recorded a 19.2 per cent drop in net profits for the first three months of 2023, to $58 million. But revenues edged higher, by 2.1 per cent to $589 billion. The decline on the profit numbers is being attributed to currency devaluations in Egypt and Lebanon. Plus, there was also the ‘partial seasonal shift’ of having Ramadan during Q1 rather than in Q2. If this seasonal impact is removed, the like-for-like revenue increase would have been 7.5 per cent rather than the 2.1 per cent that was delivered. Commodity inflation too had a hand in the squeeze on profits. "Americana Restaurants’ medium-term objective is to double revenues while targeting healthy mid-single digit like-for-like growth in sales, opening between 250-300 net new restaurants per year," the company, dual listed on Abu Dhabi's ADX and Saudi Tadawul, said in a statement. "Management believes that Saudi Arabia provides a particularly compelling opportunity for restaurant expansion, while Iraq offers an exciting greenfield opportunity." During the current period of economic headwinds in Egypt, the company will focus on operations, people transformation, and cost efficiencies." Having had one of the Gulf's biggest IPOs of recent times, Americana will