PepsiCo reports fall in first-quarter sales

Soft drinks giant giant PepsiCo Inc on Monday reported a first-quarter drop in profits and the sixth consecutive fall in sales blamed on a strong dollar.

Quarterly net income fell to $931 million, while sales dropped by 2.9 percent to $11.86 billion against $11.88 billion expected by the markets.

Core earnings per share was 89 cents against 81 cents as expected by analysts.

The company's performance in the first three months of the year was affected by a $373 million impairment charge related to its interests in the Tingyi-Asahi Beverages Holding group.

"Foreign exchange translation had a 4.5 percentage point unfavorable impact," and separating its Venezuela operations due to difficulties converting local currency to dollars "had a 2 percentage point unfavorable impact on reported net revenue," PepsiCo said.

The company said it was also affected by a depreciation of its assets in Russia.

The group reaffirmed its 2016 forecast of earnings per share of around $4.66, an increase of 2.0 percent compared with 2015.

"We are off to a strong start to the year and that gives us added confidence in achieving our financial objectives for 2016," said Chairman and CEO Indra Nooyi.