20th Feb 2019 08:56
LONDON (Alliance News) - Laura Ashley shares dropped on Wednesday after the home & fashion retailer swung to an interim loss and warned of lower annual profit.
Laura Ashley shares were trading down 6.5% at 2.95 pence, having earlier fallen as much as 21% to 2.48p. The stock is down 45% in the past 12 months.
For the six months to the end of December, the retailer posted a pretax loss of GBP1.5 million versus a pretax profit of GBP4.3 million in the comparative period a year ago.
Revenue dropped 8.8% to GBP122.9 million from GBP134.7 million as sales fells amid a difficult trading environment for the UK retail industry and the closure of four stores during the period.
Like-for-like sales during the six months fell 4.2%, with the decline partly offset by positive like-for-like Fashion sales, up 12%.
"Trading conditions have been difficult during the first six months of the year to December 2018," Chair Andrew Khoo said.
He continued: "Given the continued market turbulence and having reviewed the revised management forecast for the second half year, the board now holds the view that the performance for the entire year will fall short of market expectations."
Laura Ashley launched a new digital platform which is expected to improve online sales "in the years ahead" and continued its hospitality expansion with the opening of four new tea rooms. It now plans further openings in 2019.
The company did not propose the payment of an interim dividend, in line with the previous year.
Looking ahead, despite the expectations of lower profit, Laura Ashley said it is "better placed" to deal with the current headwinds and to move the business forward, after eliminating all long-term debts.
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