Earnings
Adidas lifts 2026 profit forecast to €2.5 billion after a record quarter boosted by a US tariff refund
Preliminary third-quarter figures show record sales and a 37% jump in operating profit, though about €200 million came from a one-off refund of US tariffs.
HedgeWeekly News Desk ·
Adidas raised its full-year 2026 operating profit forecast to about €2.5 billion from about €2.3 billion on Tuesday, after preliminary third-quarter numbers showed the highest revenue and operating profit in the German sportswear group's history. The figures came in an unscheduled ad hoc disclosure published at 18:34 CET, nine days before the full report.
Third-quarter revenue rose 9% to €7.252 billion, or 7% on a currency-neutral basis, with exchange rates weighing on the result. Gross margin widened 2.5 percentage points to 54.3%, and operating profit climbed 37% to €1.008 billion from €736 million a year earlier. Adidas still expects currency-neutral revenue growth of 9% to 10% for the year.
The company said it received most of its US tariff claims during the quarter, producing a refund of roughly €200 million that followed a US court ruling and fed directly into the margin gain. Football, running and training grew profitably, while chief executive Bjørn Gulden described the lifestyle footwear market as difficult, citing excess inventory and heavy discounting, and said he expects it to normalise. Adidas plans to reinvest about €100 million in the fourth quarter; Gulden said the group is "not trying to maximize the short-term."
For investors, the arithmetic of the upgrade matters more than the headline. The €200 million increase broadly equals the one-off tariff refund: the company says stronger trading adds about €100 million, taking the outlook to around €2.6 billion before the planned €100 million reinvestment brings it back to €2.5 billion. That leaves underlying guidance only modestly higher. The final results on October 29 should supply the regional detail the preliminary release leaves out, and the refund is a concrete example of how US tariff repayments can flow straight into margins at importers that filed claims.