MOSCOW: Russia's biggest food retailer, Magnit, reported on Tuesday a 1.2-percent year-on-year fall in first-quarter net profit due to a weaker rouble.

The company said net income was $199.9 million compared with $202.4 million in the first quarter of 2013, while in rouble terms profit rose 13.5 percent. Magnit also said its margin on the basis of earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) slid to 9.1 percent from 9.3 percent the year earlier as it started to cut prices in the middle of the first quarter.