Mercadona sets record: 1.729 million, up 24.9%

Mercadona earns 1.729 million and its margin stays at 4%

Mercadona has never made so much money. The company’s net profit reached 1.729 billion euros, 24.9% higher than the previous year, and the figure was presented as a historical record. The problem is that the same balance sheet showing this result leaves, according to calculations by those involved in the debate, a net margin around 4%. Both figures fit in the same document but do not fit well in the public conversation about food prices.

From 1,000 to 1.729 billion in three years

The sequence is striking. 1 billion in net profit in 2023, 40% higher than in 2022; 1.384 billion in 2024, 37% higher; and 1.729 billion in 2025, the best result in its history. Three consecutive years with double-digit increases in the bottom line of the income statement, in a sector that prides itself on operating with survival margins and in a country where filling the shopping cart has become the most watched economic indicator.

Why do profits rise if the margin is 4%?

There is an explanation that does not involve the cash register: the result improves when costs are cut and logistics are peine, without moving a single cent on the shelf label. Those who defend this reading point out that food distribution is a business with thin profitability, with a net margin of 4.13%, and add that the same capital placed in financial products would yield a similar return without operational risk or money tied up in stores.

The opposing argument does not dispute the arithmetic, but the origin. As another part of the debate argues, if profit grows by 25% in one year while the shopping basket becomes more than 30% more expensive over three years and wages do not trinc that pace, the conclusion drawn is that the improvement is financed by the buyer. And this reading does not need any additional figures to function.

The shopping basket rises more than 30% and wages do not keep up

In this terrain, the discussion shifts from accounting to distribution. The payer sees the same product slightly more expensive each month; the seller presents a better result each year. One part of the analysis argues that the free market is enough and that the only necessary proof is that no one is forced to cross the store door. The counterargument is that freedom of entry into the sector is theoretical: competing head-to-head with the leader requires years and billions in investment.

In other words, while the debate is framed as an ideological fight, the data supporting it is quite prosaic: entering costs a fortune. And those who cannot enter cannot lower prices.

110,000 employees and 3.7 cents per sea bass

When putting numbers on the other side of the scale, there are some, according to the debate. The company provides direct employment to more than 110,000 people, with conditions considered above average in the sector. Of each 8-euro sea bass that ends up in the cart, the net profit left to the company is 3.7 cents. For that meager amount per unit, you must buy the fish, transport it with the cold chain intact, present it on ice, and keep a store lit and climate-controlled open twelve hours a day, six days a week.

Why doesn’t competition lower prices?

Here appears the argument that most bothers critics: if prices are so inflated, anyone can open a supermarket, lower prices slightly, and take all the customers. No one has done it. The reasoning ignores, respondents from the other side argue, the purchasing scale: it is not the same to distribute one million cookies among twenty manufacturers as ten million among two, because the negotiated unit price is not the same. Supplier concentration and the weight of the private label, Hacendado, explain much of the differential. And that differential is not improvised in a rented store.

How much does Mercadona earn for each euro spent?

Around four cents. This is the order of magnitude repeated when translating net profit over total revenue, and it is the figure supporting the thesis of minimum margin. The other way to read it looks at evolution, not the snapshot: a small margin on a growing volume and rising prices leaves profits 25% higher year after year. Both readings are correct and neither cancels the other.

New customers and migration policy

One part of the analysis introduces a demographic factor: the sustained increase in resident population expands the customer base for all basics, and food is the first thing any newcomer consumes. It is a socioeconomic thesis, not an accusation: more mouths, more revenue for those selling basic goods. It is important to separate this from other arguments that mix immigration and prices without providing a single piece of data and that move, in reality, in the realm of politics.

What the next years will say

With this cost structure and this market share, the forecast managed in the debate is that profit will continue to rise as long as the shopping basket continues to rise. No sector mechanism seems to force the opposite, and competition has shown no signs of wanting to force it. However, if the margin stays at that 4% cited by participants and the increase depends on the final price, the remaining question is how long the buyer can endure without real alternatives. It is an economic question, not an ideological one. And it remains unanswered.