Marks And Spencer Share Discussion Threads

[philanderer] 04/11/2020 13:26

'Marks & Spencer falls to first loss as Covid crisis hits clothing sales

Half-year loss of £87.6m comes as new coronavirus restrictions create more uncertainty

[zztop] 04/11/2020 13:22

Couple of tomatoes would be good

[careful] 04/11/2020 12:59

Post Covid MKS need tomato a mere £200m pre tax to justify todays share price.
Ocado going well.

Worth holding or adding.

[qantas] 04/11/2020 12:53

Retailer Marks & Spencer rallied despite saying that it swung to a half-year loss as coronavirus lockdowns hit its clothing division. The company posted a pre-tax loss of £87.6m from a profit of £159m a year earlier.

Richard Hunter, head of markets at Interactive Investor, said: "While an historic loss cannot be ignored, Marks & Spencer is working at pace to transform its business and there are some signs of early success.

"The streamlining is likely to result in annualised cost savings of £115 million, the online channel is receiving particular attention to modernise the overall offering and the Food business has maintained its position as a positive contributor to the business."

Please do your own research as always..

[debsdowner] 04/11/2020 12:49

robot,

Redundancies are mounting, quite a shock for John Lewis employees as 1,300 jobs had already been axed and many employees would have thought that was the end. I did however predict that their would be more job losses.

The employees only told today and they will be having a miserable Christmas.

Is it possible you can employ a few on your farms?

They will have to get used to outdoor work picking but it may keep them fitter in the end if you cab get their weight down.

Less money on minimum wage but het what its better than nothing!

MARKS & SPENCER INVESTORS excluded of course you don't want nat brained people working for your empire.

[debsdowner] 04/11/2020 12:38

Breaking news:

John Lewis announces more job losses with 1,500 culled and Patrick Lewis their finance director given the red card and he is leaving the partnership:

[johnwise] 04/11/2020 12:36

VIDEO

MSM FAIL 🤦‍♂;️ Polls Wrong, Lefty Daily Mail, BBC, Social Media Left Bias & Silencing / Editing Reality

[pwal] 04/11/2020 12:32

That should put the share price for Lloyds up then!

[debsdowner] 04/11/2020 12:27

Breaking news:

Lyoyds Bank to cut a further 730 jobs

[dvb99] 04/11/2020 11:58

@1224SSJ
"Loss of 84m, shares go up, casino"

I think that's better than expected. I was thinking M&S would post loss of over £100m.
Might trawl through these results, potential recovery stock in the medium term.
There's probably a lot of pent up demand with older folks, who have been stuck indoors, during COVID, and maybe dont use Internet etc.

[porsche1945] 04/11/2020 11:38

Terminal decline, everyone knows this is a damage limitation exercise and MKS will do well to survive in any form, ftse 350 just hopeless and the UK in general best days are long behind it, having a trashed currency doesn't help, led by idiots, brexit a self harming impoverishing disaster and that’s without covid wiping everything out except tech. Time to emigrate.

[debsdowner] 04/11/2020 11:25

Hargreaves Lansdowne:



Comment:

MARKS dealing with debt better than John Lewis, and food sales improving the business as a whole. But the question is can this be sustained in this competitive environment which will get more cut throat due to higher unemployment.

Its a difficult call with a second lockdown hence the company are cautious coming up to Christmas.

[robot ic1] 04/11/2020 10:31

Debsdowner and Qantas good morning .

hammering down here double dip recession .

biden votes to widen for a win

trump votes to flump for a loss

[philanderer] 04/11/2020 09:32

We did not pay a final dividend for 2019/20 and the board has announced the decision not to pay a dividend for the 2020/21 financial year

[paulof2] 04/11/2020 09:02

As expected huge expectations beat and the market likes it.

Solid results given covid with lots of green shoots appearing.

All the doom and gloom very unnecessary when it’s already priced in at these levels.

[diku] 04/11/2020 08:44

Is the so called retail guru Norman still there?...

[johnwise] 04/11/2020 08:36

Presidential Race Results

Biden cannot win at this point, he cannot get to 270. It's over.

[johnwise] 04/11/2020 08:34

The free West is still feeding the crocodile, hoping they will be the last one eaten

Another hit from Communist China ..

MKS first loss in 94 years.

[1224saj] 04/11/2020 08:33

Loss of 84m, shares go up, casino

[xxxxxy] 04/11/2020 08:31

And looking positive.

[debsdowner] 04/11/2020 08:08

Overall market falling on US election and analysts will trawl over MARKS results later.

[debsdowner] 04/11/2020 08:06

No a good day to announce news and a good day to take focus off results due to US election. If you want to hide bad news you do it on a day like this.

MARKS

Outlook

There remains significant uncertainty regarding the near-term outlook in relation to both Covid and Brexit. Trading in the first four weeks of the second half has continued at similar rates to the end of Q2, with Food revenue up 3.0%, C&H revenue down 21.5% and International revenue up 7.4% due to the timing of shipments.

Although trading strongly, the business is entering a period of new Covid-related restrictions including the proposed circuit breaker lockdown. This will impact C&H profit as store sales are significantly reduced, albeit offset by increased online sales and reduced costs supported by furlough income. Prior to this impact our planning assumption for the balance of H2 in Clothing & Home was for similar sales trends to the first few weeks of H2. We enter this period with C&H stock levels down by more than GBP100m on last year and with less stock hibernated to next Spring than previously envisaged.

The group has made substantial plans to ensure customers can shop with confidence this Christmas, including the expansion of the teams to serve online orders by 30% in Castle Donington and an increase in-store picking capacity and the introduction of the book and shop app to help eliminate the requirement to queue over peak. We have also invested behind product lines which will provide flexible options for smaller gatherings.

Throughout this uncertain period and as we start to emerge from the crisis, our financial priority is to fund the transformation while focusing on generating cash and strengthening the balance sheet. Our objective is to ensure the business emerges from these uncertainties in a stronger, leaner and more focused position and with balance sheet metrics consistent with investment grade in the medium term.

We expect to report a third quarter trading update on 8 January 2021.

[debsdowner] 04/11/2020 08:01

kreature

Exactly !