Source: Procter & Gamble.
Procter & Gamble (PG 0.62%) posted earnings results this past week that were, in a word, underwhelming. Sales grew by 3% for the consumer goods giant, at the low end of P&G's full-year guidance. Meanwhile, profits ticked higher by just 5% despite huge cost cuts.
In the video below, Fool contributor Demitrios Kalogeropoulos puts those results in perspective, noting that revenue growth significantly lagged that of competitor Colgate-Palmolive (CL 0.67%), which managed to boost its sales by 6.5% last quarter. On the other hand, P&G's profit figure isn't as bad as it might seem, Demitrios argues, given that foreign currency movements lopped 12 percentage points off earnings growth. Stripping out those temporary headwinds, he notes, would have resulted in an impressive 17% profit jump as opposed to the 5% P&G reported. The bottom line is that shareholders can expect middling sales growth in the next year with much faster earnings improvement ahead -- and plenty of cash returns in the form of dividends and share repurchases.
