(Reuters) -Procter & Gamble Co beat quarterly sales estimates on Wednesday, as the consumer goods giant benefited from higher prices and resurgent demand for cleaning products due to a spike in COVID-19 infections.
P&G’s shares rose 1.8% in premarket trading after the company also raised its full-year organic sales forecast to a range of 4-5% from 2-4% earlier.
P&G said sales in fabric & home care unit, the company’s biggest segment and home to brands such as Tide and Mr. Clean, rose 7% in its second quarter, as the rapid spread of the Omicron coronavirus variant since late last year led to consumers stocking up again on detergents and surface cleaning products.
Overall net sales rose 6% to $20.95 billion, also helped by price increases the company implemented last year to cope with higher commodity and freight costs. Analysts on average had expected sales of $20.34 billion, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.
P&G said it now expects a hit of about $2.8 billion related to commodity and freight costs this fiscal year, compared with a prior forecast of about $2.3 billion.
(Reporting by Uday Sampath in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju Samuel)
