BERLIN, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) -- The German wholesale group Metro achieved its sales targets with a total turnover of 29.9 billion euros (33.3 billion U.S. dollars) in the 2018-2019 fiscal year, the company announced on Thursday.
Eastern Europe excluding Russia as well as Asia, where turnover increased by 6.3 percent and 5.1 percent respectively, would remain the "main growth drivers" for Metro, commented Olaf Koch, chief executive officer (CEO).
Metro's business in Russia has improved compared to the previous year but the market environment remained "nevertheless challenging" as turnover in Russia still declined by 4.3 percent in 2018-2019.
Turnover in western Europe excluding Metro's home market Germany increased by 1.3 percent, while business in Germany was stable and turnover grew slightly by 0.3 percent.
Metro's business with hotels, restaurants and catering services (HoReCa) as well as traders, such as small shops and kiosks, also contributed to the company's turnover, according to the company.
The increasing importance of HoReCa and trader customers was in line with CEO Koch's plans to restructure Metro and put the focus on wholesale customers. In addition, Metro is currently planning to sell its retail subsidiary Real to the German retail real estate investor Redos.
As part of a large company restructuring at Metro, the German wholesale company recently sold the majority stake of its China business to China's Wumei Technology Group.
"As a result of the sale of a majority stake in Metro China to Wumei, the core customer groups HoReCa and trader will account for about 70 percent of Metro's global sales," Sabrina Ley, director of investor relations at Metro, told Xinhua on Thursday.
