Sydney, Feb 26, 2026, 17:55 AEDT — Market closed.
- Sigma Healthcare shares closed down 1.7% after swinging between A$2.93 and A$3.20.
- The Chemist Warehouse owner posted double-digit growth in half-year earnings and revenue.
- Traders now watch early second-half sales momentum and the March dividend timetable.
Sigma Healthcare Ltd (ASX:SIG) shares ended Thursday down 1.7% at A$2.94, after an early rally fizzled as the market closed. The stock opened at A$3.15 and touched A$3.20 before sliding to session lows. (StockAnalysis)
The half-year print matters because it is one of the first clean checkpoints for the merged Sigma–Chemist Warehouse group, and it lands late in Australia’s earnings season when investors are quick to switch from “beat” headlines to cash flow and execution.
Friday’s session will test whether the stock’s intraday reversal was a one-off shakeout or a change in tone, especially with retail-facing names still trading on thin evidence about how consumers are holding up.
The broader S&P/ASX 200 finished up about 0.5% on the day, leaving Sigma’s late fade looking more like company-specific selling than a market wobble. (AP News)
Sigma said normalised EBIT — earnings before interest and tax, adjusted for merger and other one-offs — rose 18.7% to A$582.9 million for the half-year ended Dec. 31, while normalised net profit after tax rose 19.2% to A$392.0 million. Revenue rose 14.9% to A$5.5 billion on a pro-forma basis, it said.
Chemist Warehouse-branded store sales in Australia rose 17.2% to A$5.1 billion and like-for-like sales — a measure that strips out new stores — rose 15.0%, Pharmacy Daily reported, adding that sales were helped by demand for GLP-1 medicines, a class of diabetes and weight-loss drugs. Chief executive Vikesh Ramsunder said the group was “progressing the integration with discipline,” according to the report. (Pharmacy Daily)
Still, the day’s price action was a reminder that not all “good” numbers land the same way. Growth tied to hot categories like GLP-1 drugs can cool as comparisons get harder, and integration work has a habit of throwing up costs at awkward moments.
Investors will also watch whether store rollout and brand changes translate into steadier margins, rather than just faster sales, and whether the early second-half trading update holds up once the market gets past the first read-through.
In its half-year filing, Sigma reported statutory sales revenue of A$5.51 billion and NPAT attributable to owners of A$379.8 million, and said the prior-year comparative results reflect Chemist Warehouse only because of the reverse acquisition completed on Feb. 12, 2025. The company also confirmed a fully franked interim dividend of 2.0 Australian cents per share — meaning it carries Australian tax credits — with an ex-dividend date of March 4, a record date of March 5 and payment expected on March 20.
