First, I would like to express my sincere appreciation for your continued understanding and support of Sanrio's activities.
Overseas, the situation remains unstable, with prolonged conflicts in certain regions. Domestically, consumer spending appears to have stagnated somewhat due to rising prices. Despite these circumstances, Sanrio's closing share price on October 7 reached 4,240 yen, enabling us to surpass our long-term goal of achieving a market capitalization of 1 trillion yen. On November 1, we announced our financial results for the first half of fiscal year ending March 31, 2025. Driven by initiatives related to the 50th anniversary of Hello Kitty and the strategy of featuring a wide range of Sanrio characters, the favorable trend continued, resulting in record-high quarterly operating profit and an upward revision to the full-year earnings forecast.
I would like to once again express my deepest gratitude to our shareholders and all other stakeholders for their support, which has contributed to the continuation of our strong performance from the previous fiscal year.
As management, we will continue to strive toward realizing our corporate philosophy, “Minna Nakayoku (Getting Along Together)," and our vision, "One World, Connecting Smiles," which supports this philosophy. We sincerely ask for your continued understanding and support of Sanrio's initiatives, which underpin our sales and profit figures.
In order to continue to grow as a truly global entertainment company, Sanrio will continue its activities to bring smiles to as many people as possible and spread the circle of happiness around the world. To do so, we are working on businesses to both bring more "familiar smiles" and create "new smiles." Above all, we aim to create even more experiences of "Time Feeling Close to Sanrio" and "Time Deeply Absorbed in Sanrio," expanding "Sanrio Time" for people all around the world.
Through these initiatives, Sanrio is committed to delivering even more smiles to people around the world and to meeting the expectations of society as a whole, including our valued shareholders.
I deeply value your continued understanding and support.
December 2024
President and CEO
