Paris (France) (AFP) – French luxury house Hermes reported Thursday an increase in 2025 sales even though it faced steep US tariffs and a weak dollar, which made its leather handbags and other goods more pricey for customers worldwide. Revenue rose 5.5 percent to 16 billion euros ($19 billion), with all regions seeing increases, the company said in a statement.
Net profit slipped 1.7 percent to 4.5 billion, which the group attributed to a one-time tax of 330 million euros imposed by the French government on major companies as an “exceptional contribution” to help the country cut debt. Without the levy, profit was up 5.5 percent on the year, chief executive Axel Dumas said in presenting the results to journalists. “I can’t make any forecasts for 2026,” he added. “We’ve returned to a world where every two years there’s some problem somewhere, or there’s a region that’s stuck.” Nonetheless, he said he expected “very strong growth in the United States, and Europe to hold up.”
President Donald Trump’s steep tariffs on European firms threatened to eat into Hermes’s sales, but the company said in October that it had kept prices steady since the EU-US tariff deal in July. That resulted in most EU exports facing a 15 percent US levy. The dollar’s decline against the euro and other currencies also made its silk scarves and other goods more expensive, yet demand held up over the year, Dumas said. Sales in the Americas rose 7.3 percent to 3.1 billion euros, while Europe sales gained 9.6 percent to 3.9 billion euros. In Asia, which generates the bulk of Hermes’s revenue, sales rose 2.6 percent to 8.3 billion.
The company will propose a full-year dividend of 18 euros per share at its shareholders’ meeting in April, up from 16 euros last year. But its annual bonus to its 26,500 employees worldwide will fall to 3,000 euros, down from 4,500 euros.
© 2024 AFP
