LONDON MARKETS: Ted Baker Shares Sliced By A Third After Reporting First-half Loss

By Steve Goldstein, MarketWatch

Shares in U.K.-listed retailer Ted Baker lost more than a third of its value as the company swung to a loss for the first half.

Ted Baker (TED.LN) shares dropped 35% as the company posted a GBP23 million loss before tax for the 28 weeks ending Aug. 10, with revenue weakening 0.7% to GBP303.8 million. It cut its dividend by more than half and said second-half trading has "started slowly" due to unseasonably warm weather.

Analysts at Liberum Capital slashed their pretax profit estimate for the full year by about 39%. "Forecasts and outlook have been impacted by a very tough market backdrop where discounting is prevalent, and consumer uncertainty has led to unpredictable trading patterns," the brokerage said.

Ted Baker shares have now lost 74% over the last 12 months.

The large-cap FTSE 100 meanwhile dropped 0.37% to 7096.11, after suffering its worst percentage decline in two-and-a-half years on Wednesday.

Miners including Glencore (GLEN.LN) and Anglo American (AAL.LN) paced declines.

Diageo shares (DGE.LN) rose 1.4% as tariffs imposed on the beverage maker by the U.S. were not as steep as analysts had feared.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 03, 2019 06:36 ET (10:36 GMT)

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