“Following excellent H1 top line in Amazon and margin progression, we are raising our forecast range for organic operating income growth to plus 11% to plus 12.5%.”

In context

“strong H1 organic performance compared to our target ranges for the full year. While combustible volume dynamic and the phasing of comparison and cost are less favorable in H2, our fundamental outlook remains very good. We expect continued strong momentum on both IQOS and ZYN alongside robust pricing and meaningful margin improvement. We expect further double digit HTU adjusted IMS progression with growth skewed to the fourth quarter given a strong comparison in Q3. Three. We forecast Q3 HTU shipment of 38.5 to 39.5 billion and dynamic growth in adjusted diluted EPS to $2.08 to $2.13 including strong investment and a favorable currency variance of five cents at prevailing rates. The full year, we continue to expect very strong organic net revenue growth in the range of plus 6% to plus 8%. Following excellent H1 top line in Amazon and margin progression, we are raising our forecast range for organic operating income growth to plus 11% to plus 12.5%. We are also raising our currency neutral adjusted diluted EPS growth to plus 11.5 to plus 13.5%. This includes a slightly improved effective corporate tax rate of approximately 22% to 23%, based on the latest assessment of tax dynamic and market mix. We are still reviewing the implication of the OBBB Act US tax reform. In dollar terms, we expect adjusted diluted EPS growth of plus 13% to plus 15%. This includes an estimated ten cent favorable currency impact at prevailing exchange rate with favorable earnings translation from the broadly weaker dollar partly offset by transactional impact due to currency volatility which I covered earlier. Given our expectation for a strong full year profit delivery and cash conversion, we are raising our forecast for operating cash flow to around $11.5 b”