British American Tobacco 2022 revenue 27.7bn: e-cigarette business to return to profit a year early

Its new category division - made up of e-cigarettes, tobacco heating products and nicotine bags - contributed £2.9bn, up 40.9%.

Chief Executive Jack Powers said the division now expects to return to profitability by 2024, a year earlier than previously expected.

"Our new category business has delivered strong volume, revenue and market share growth and has become a significant contributor to the group's financial delivery." 'he said. "In 2022, we invested more than £2bn in new categories to drive long-term sustainable growth, while making excellent progress in reducing our operating loss by 62%."

Group operating profits also rose slightly to £10.5bn.

Bat said a series of one-off charges, including the divestment of its Russian business and the need for a grant due to a US investigation into alleged historical sanctions violations, drove down profits.

Bowles added that it expected the deal to spin off its Russian operations to an unnamed joint management-distributor consortium, which would be completed this year.

Adjusted operating profit came in at £12.4bn, in line with expectations.

However, BAT shares fell 4.5 percent to 2,953 pence today, with diluted earnings per share down 1 percent to 291.9 pence.

The group also today declared a dividend of 230.9p a share, up 6 per cent on last year's payout. However, TadeuMarroco, director of finance and transformation, said BAT would take a pragmatic approach to capital allocation and prioritise strengthening its balance sheet.

Last week, BAT announced a restructuring of its regional divisions, which included merging Europe with non-US Americas. A spokesman told the Standard at the time that the new plan could result in layoffs, but that no decisions had been made on the matter.