Varun Beverages shares: Brokerages bullish ahead of dividend record date, Q1 earnings 

Shares of Varun Beverages Ltd will turn ex-dividend this week. The Pepsico bottler has fixed Friday, April 4, 2025 as the record date for the receipt of final dividend of Rs 0.50/- per equity share for the financial year ended December 31, 2024. The final dividend once approved by equity shareholders at their 30th Annual General Meeting scheduled on Thursday, April 3, 2025, will be paid on and from Monday, April 7, 2025 to those shareholders whose name appears in the Register of Members of the Company or in the list of beneficial owners maintained by the Depositories as on Friday, April 4, 2025. 

The stock will also be affected by the Q1 earnings set to be announced during the upcoming results season.  

Brokerage KR Choksey is bullish on the stock and has assigned a price target of Rs 657. 

The brokerage sees a 7.5% YoY rise in Q1 net profit, reflecting strong operating performance. Key factors behind the brokerage's stance include VBL’s expansion into international markets and its recent acquisition in South Africa.

The company is planning to launch a Jeera-flavored beverage this season.

In Q1, KR Choksey expects Varun Beverages to report a 10.7% YoY (29.5% QoQ) revenue growth, driven by volume growth of 13.7% YoY (+27.0% QoQ). 

EBITDA margins are seen rising by 60 bps YoY, led by positive operating leverage.

"We expect Revenue/EBITDA/Adj. PAT to grow by 22.1%/23.2%/27.9% CAGR over CY24-26E. We apply a P/E multiple of 52.0x on CY26E EPS of INR 12.6, resulting in a target price of Rs 657/share," said  KR Choksey. 

Domestic brokerage Motilal Oswal has assigned a price target of Rs 680 on the stock. 

"Factoring in strong fundamentals and potential for future growth, we build in 18%16%/27% revenue/EBITDA/PAT CAGR over CY24-26 and reiterate our BUY rating for the stock. We value the stock at 55x Mar’27E EPS to arrive at a target price of of Rs 680," said the brokerage. 

JM Financial has a 'Buy' rating on the Varun Beverages stock with a target price of Rs 675 per share. The recent correction was ‘overdone’, and ‘prevailing market pessimism’ should be an opportunity to buy more shares of the company, it said. 

In the current session, Varun Beverages stock was trading 0.47% lower at Rs 537.05 on BSE. A total of 0.33 lakh shares of the firm changed hands, amounting to a turnover of Rs 1.82 crore. On the other hand, the stock has risen 27.10% from its 52-week low of Rs 419.40 reached on March 3 this year. 

The stock has a beta of 0.8, indicating very low volatility in a year. 

In terms of technicals, the relative strength index (RSI) of Varun Beverages stands at 58.3, signaling the stock is trading neither in the overbought nor in the oversold zone. Varun Beverages shares are trading higher than the 5 day, 10 day, 20 day, 30 day, 50 day but lower than the 100 day, 150 day and 200 day moving averages.

Varun Beverages is a beverage company. It operates franchisee of PepsiCo. The company produces and distributes a range of carbonated soft drinks (CSDs), as well as a large selection of non-carbonated beverages (NCBs), including packaged drinking water sold under trademarks owned by PepsiCo.