British American Tobacco PLC (LSE:BATS) shares were stubbed out by investors on Tuesday after the cigarette maker finance chief stepped down with immediate effect.
Soraya Benchikh is stepping down from the board with effect from today, the FTSE 100 company said, though she will remain available until the end of the year to support the transition to a successor.
BAT said the recruitment process to identify a new CFO is being launched, with the role to be filled temporarily by Javed Iqbal, who is currently the director in charge of digital and information. He has previously worked as interim finance director in 2023 and 2024.
CEO Tadeu Marroco, who has been in charge since May 2023, said Benchikh "has made a significant contribution to BAT" over many years, having rejoined the group in May 2024.
"As we set out at our recent results, our performance in the first half of the year was slightly ahead of our expectations, and we are firmly on track to deliver our full year guidance," he said.
"With the right strategy we intend to continue to deliver on the profitable transformation of BAT, reflected in our stated ambitions for 2026 and beyond. We will update on our continued progress in our pre-close trading update in December."
Benchikh said she was "proud of my role in the significant progress since I joined BAT, as reflected in our recent results", highlighting her role in "embedding financial discipline" and working on improving profit margins in the vaping and other New Categories products.
Analysts at AJ Bell said the immediate exit of a finance chief at a company always "raises alarm bells".
However, they added that the statement included "no suggestion of anything amiss", further reassured that Benchikh will be available to support the switchover until the end of the year.
"Nonetheless, her sudden exit still raises some questions and the market may be disappointed a key architect in turning around the company’s financial performance will no longer be a part of the management team – particularly as she has not been there that long."