Kering Revenue Reaches €3,345 Million as Shares Fall 16% in October
Key Facts
Kering said revenue reached €3,345 million in the third quarter of 2026, flat on a reported basis and down 1% on a comparable basis from the same period a year earlier. The French group said customer traffic remained the main constraint on business, pointing to the difficulty of converting store visits into sales. The results came as luxury brands faced varying pressures, from weak demand in China to geopolitical disruptions that affected store traffic. Kering shares fell 16% on Friday, October 23, after the company reported its results the previous day. Reuters described the stock as heading for its worst trading day on record at the time, in a reaction that reflected investor concern about continued sales declines.
Gucci, Kering’s largest brand, performed worse than the group as a whole, with third-quarter revenue of €1,291 million, down 6% on a comparable basis and 4% on a reported basis. The company partly attributed the performance to lower customer traffic in Asia-Pacific, particularly in China and Japan. This leaves the brand facing the challenge of regaining momentum in two important markets, while customer traffic remained, according to Kering, the main constraint on revenue. In response to the pressures, the group closed a net 105 stores in the first nine months of 2026. It said it planned net closures of at least 125 stores during the year, reflecting the continued reshaping of its store network alongside weak sales.
The slowdown extended to LVMH, where organic revenue in its fashion and leather goods division fell 5% in the third quarter from the same period last year. The company said the division was affected by slower demand in China, despite benefiting from strength in the U.S. market. It added that the U.S., Europe and Japan posted good growth during the quarter, while conditions were less buoyant in China. Chief Financial Officer Cécile Cabanis said Asia was affected by “a sharp deterioration, driven by macroeconomic factors, in Chinese consumer sentiment,” with a tangible impact on discretionary spending. The results show diverging performance across regions and markets, rather than a uniform weakening in global demand for luxury goods.
The results came against a backdrop of broader pressure on the sector, with Reuters noting that the widening war in the Middle East and China’s tax campaign targeting the wealthy added to pressure on luxury goods companies in the third quarter. The report also cited disruptions that led to store closures in Paris and Milan. On October 13, shares in Hermès, Kering and Richemont fell between 1% and 2.2% after LVMH’s results, while Reuters quoted Cabanis as saying that declining consumer sentiment in China weighed on discretionary spending. Reuters estimated that European luxury groups had lost about €330 billion in market value from the start of 2026 through October 13, and that LVMH shares had lost about 40% over the period. These figures reflect the scale of the sector’s revaluation amid the combined pressures from China and geopolitics and differing sales trends across markets.
China remains in focus for the sector, with the monthly purchasing managers’ index report due on October 31, 2026, at 9:30 a.m., according to the National Bureau of Statistics of China’s calendar. The manufacturing PMI stood at 50.1% in September, up 0.3 percentage points from August, while the non-manufacturing activity index was 50.2%. The upcoming reading offers a near-term economic indicator alongside company data on demand, but it does not directly measure luxury goods sales. In U.S. trading data, the LVMH depositary receipt closed at $85.96 on October 29, and the Kering depositary receipt closed at $19.75 the same day. These prices are for American depositary receipts, while Kering’s sharp share move took place on its European exchange in the October 23 session.