JD Sports raises profit forecast to £400m
The news follows the fashion retailers Christmas trading update which showed that total revenues, on a like-for-like basis rose by more than 5% in the 22 weeks to 2 January 2021 compared with the same period last year
JD Sports has announced that its headline profit-before-tax for the full year to 30 January 2021 will be “significantly ahead” of the current market expectation of £295m to at least £400m for the full year.
The news follows the fashion retailers Christmas trading update which showed that total revenues, on a like-for-like basis rose by more than 5% in the 22 weeks to 2 January 2021 compared with the same period last year, which was predominantly due to higher demand in online shopping.
Whilst the group said it was confident that it has the “proposition to continue to attract” consumers throughout this period, the process to scale down activity in stores and scale up the digital channels at considerable short notice through the lockdown measures, has presented “significant challenges”.
Under normal circumstances, JD Sports reiterated its confidence that the results for the forthcoming year to 29 January 2022 would show a strong improvement on the current year.
However, given the ongoing uncertain outlook with stores in the UK likely to be closed until at least Easter and closures in other countries possible at any time, the company has estimated that its headline profit before tax for the full year to 29 January 2022 will be 5% to 10% ahead of the current year.
The next trading update in the group’s preliminary results for the year ended 30 January 2021 which will be published on 13 April 2021.
