Today’s news in brief-26/1/24

Superdry reported a challenging trading environment with half-year revenues down 23.5% to £219.8m. The wholesale division faced a significant decline of 41.1%, while the retail segment, though more resilient, was down 13.1%. Store revenue in the UK and Republic of Ireland saw a 10.2% decline due to unseasonal weather impacting footfall and conversion. Adjusted loss before tax was £25.3m, reflecting weaker trading performance. Superdry closed 12 stores in the half year and ended with 216 owned stores. Superdry also announced the appointment of Giles David as the new chief financial officer (CFO), succeeding Shaun Wills from January 29. Retail crime in the UK has hit its highest rate in 20 years, with over 400,000 incidents of shoplifting in the year to September 2023, a 32% increase from the previous year. The British Retail Consortium estimated the cost of retail crime at £1.7bn . Sainsbury’s CEO, Simon Roberts, supported calls for tougher retail laws as abuse and physical attacks on shop workers escalated. The government's Retail Crime Action Plan, unveiled in October, aims to counteract the rise in crime by outlining police responses to theft reports and investigations. Marks & Spencer (M&S) made two new executive appointments: Rachel Higham as chief digital and technology officer and Mark Lemming as managing director of International. Higham, currently CIO at WPP, will join later this year, while Lemming, promoted from a role at M&S, will start his new position in the upcoming financial year. Both roles will sit on the executive committee. M&S CEO Stuart Machin highlighted the importance of digital, technology, and international growth in the company's transformation. WH Smith reported a strong performance in the 20 weeks ending January 20, with total revenues up 8%, driven by its Travel division. Travel UK saw a 15% increase in total revenue and a 14% rise on a like-for-like basis. The company opened its largest UK Travel store at Birmingham airport. The UK High Street division also performed well, with store like-for-like revenue up 1% in December. WH Smith expressed confidence in significant growth for the year 2024. John Lewis Partnership hinted at potential job cuts after reducing its redundancy payouts. The retailer slashed its current two-week redundancy pay per year of service policy in half, stating it was higher than typical market practice and came at a high cost. The company offers "partnership redundancy pay" on top of statutory pay. John Lewis emphasised that partner redundancies are a last resort, and most staff would not be affected by the changes. The move is part of efforts to make the redundancy package more affordable and support the turnaround plan. The retailer is also considering changes to reset the current pay policy, giving more control to management for performance-linked pay rises.