Best of the Brokers for 29 September 2015 September 29, 2015 To appear in Best of the Brokers, email your research to notes@cityam.com HOME RETAIL GROUP Cantor Fitzgerald believes Home Retail Group has reached rock bottom after a year of underperformance in the stock. It has therefore upgraded its recommendation from “hold” to “buy” and kept its target price steady at 195p. The broker said that [...]
Whitbread’s Costa coffee chain to pay baristas above National Living Wage September 30, 2015 First it was Starbucks. Now coffee chain Costa has also followed suit by announcing a pay hike for its staff ahead of the government’s national living wage. From tomorrow Costa baristas in London (of all ages) will earn a minimum of £8.20 an hour, rising to over £9, the Whitbread-owned chain said. Meanwhile staff working [...]
Tesco and Sainsbury’s vs Asda and Morrisons: Britain’s biggest retailers row over Sunday trading laws August 5, 2015 British businesses are readying for a fight over government plans to shake up Sunday trading rules. The government will today open a formal consultation on proposals to give local areas the power to allow large shops to open for longer on Sundays. Current laws allow smaller shops to stay open all day, but limit larger [...]
Former Sainsbury’s boss Justin King bats away online store threat November 3, 2014 Former Sainsbury’s boss Justin King yesterday warned grocers not to neglect bricks-and-mortar stores at the expense of online shopping. The former FTSE 100 CEO, who left Sainsbury’s in July after 10 years at the helm, said 96p in every pound spent on food in Britain was still done so in physical stores. “If you remember [...]
Supermarkets Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Morrisons told they must shrink to survive in war against discounters Aldi and Lidl November 17, 2014 Supermarkets need to dramatically scale down their store estates if they want to stop haemorrhaging sales and return to growth, according to analysts at Goldman Sachs who sent a stark warning to the retail industry. In a research note published yesterday, Goldman Sachs said Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Morrisons must cut space by around 20 per [...]
UK grocery sector shows green shoots of recovery as distress levels fall October 19, 2015 Britain’s supermarket sector is showing signs of recovery, according to new research from Begbies Traynor that reveals the number of companies struggling to stay afloat declined for the first time in over two years. The business recovery specialist’s latest Red Flag Alert research, which monitors the health of UK companies, shows levels of “significant” financial [...]
Trouble for the big four supermarkets as Aldi and Lidl growth speeds up again October 20, 2015 German discounters Aldi and Lidl both saw growth rates return to over 17 per cent over the last three months, dashing hopes for the Big Four that a slowdown earlier in the year may have been part of a longer term trend. The cut-price chains have been the fastest-growing grocers in the sector for some time now. But in [...]
Pay hike on the cards as Oliver Bonas becomes first UK high street chain to pay living wage August 31, 2015 Gifts and homeware retailer Oliver Bonas has provided a major boost to the high street after committing to paying its staff the living wage. The chain, which has 43 UK stores as well as a warehouse and head office in Chessington, announced it will start paying all directly-employed staff and third party contractors at [...]
Nightmare before Halloween? UK retailers are facing a pumpkin shortage October 9, 2015 Forget things that go bump in the night – this Halloween, retailers could face a real nightmare: a massive pumpkin shortage, with early signs suggesting wet weather could squash the hopes of thousands of British shoppers in the run-up to Halloween. An estimated 10m pumpkins are grown in the UK every year. And Sainsbury’s said it expects customers to buy almost 1.5 million pumpkins, with just [...]
Morrisons follows Lidl and pledges to pay above National Living Wage September 29, 2015 Morrisons has followed in the steps of German discounter Lidl after announcing a 20 per cent pay hike for its staff in line with the new Living Wage. The supermarket, which is striving to turn itself around after years of declining sales, said more than 90,000 staff across all age brackets would benefit from a [...]