Danone Raises Guidance After Closing WhiteWave Buy

Danone, the world's biggest yogurt maker, raised its guidance for recurring earnings per share growth for 2017, days after closing its $10.4 billion acquisition of WhiteWave.

The French company said it was now targeting double-digit recurring EPS growth at constant exchange rates, instead of a rise of "at least 5%" it had targeted in February when it didn't include WhiteWave.

Danone agreed to buy the U.S. organic-foods producer in a deal that more than doubled its North American business in its biggest deal for almost a decade.

Meanwhile, the company said its sales in the January-March period rose 3% to EUR5.46 billion, helped by organic growth of 0.7%. That performance was in line with the average estimates of analysts.

Danone on Thursday confirmed all of its targets linked to the WhiteWave deal, including $300 million in synergies.

Write to Nick Kostov at nick.kostov@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 20, 2017 12:56 ET (16:56 GMT)