(Reuters) -Saint Gobain plans to spend around 12 billion euros ($14 billion) to grow its business through organic investments and acquisitions under its 2026-2030 strategy, which has also earmarked roughly 8 billion euros for shareholder returns, the French construction group said on Monday.
Around 6 billion euros will be paid out in dividends, with the remaining 2 billion to be distributed in share buybacks, it said.
The company also raised the financial targets for the next four years, compared to the ones it had set for 2021-2025, and said it aimed to outperform the wider market with mid-single-digit percentage growth in sales on average.
It targets a core profit (EBITDA) margin of between 15% and 18%, up from 13% to 15% seen in the previous strategy.
Saint Gobain’s chairman and CEO Benoit Bazin said in a statement that the company planned to expand into new “high-growth markets”, namely North America, Asia-Pacific and emerging countries.
The group expects these growth markets to account for close to 60% of its sales in the long term, versus around 50% today.
($1 = 0.8539 euros)
(Reporting by Mateusz Rabiega in Gdansk, editing by Milla Nissi-Prussak)
