SuperGroup in Xmas boom January 12, 2011 SHARES in SuperGroup, the firm behind the Superdry fashion brand, jumped more than 19 per cent yesterday after the company reported its best ever Christmas trading. For the nine weeks to 2 January, total sales almost doubled to £65.1m from a year ago. The company said it had managed to counter the impact of rising [...]
N Brown upbeat despite hit from snowy weather January 12, 2011 MAIL order clothing firm N Brown saw like-for-like sales lifted by just 1.2 per cent over Christmas as the poor weather took its toll. Total group revenue increased by 4.6 per cent in the 19 weeks to 8 January and Brown says trading was encouraging from late October to mid-December “but the extreme weather conditions [...]
Greggs in boost from mince pies January 12, 2011 GREGGS, the high street bakery, sold eight million mince pies over the Christmas period – up 16 per cent on the previous year. The group, which has almost 1,500 shops, said shoppers who were kept indoors by the snow hit the high streets to do last-minute shopping. For the five weeks to 8 January total [...]
TOP RISERS AND FALLERS January 12, 2011 Miners and banks drove the FTSE up to 6,051 yesterday as a successful debt issue in Portugal reassured investors. Vedanta and Eurasian Natural Resources both benefitted from analyst upgrades by Deutsche Bank. A referendum in Kazakhstan on the president’s rule also helped. National Grid, GKN and J Sainsbury all dropped back. Eurasian Natural Resources – [...]
Restaurant Group lifts profit target as it targets new openings to fuel growth January 12, 2011 RESTAURANT Group has forecast full-year profit just ahead of market estimates as better-than-expected trading at its new sites offset the impact of heavy snowfall in the UK. The company, which owns the Garfunkel’s and Frankie & Benny’s chains, said revenue for the 53 weeks to 2 January was seven per cent ahead of 2009, while [...]
Hobbs bags £14m of new investment from backer 3i January 12, 2011 FASHION retailer Hobbs has received a new £14m investment from 3i, its majority shareholder, and appointed former Maximuscle chairman Iain MacRitchie as its new chair. The retailer said that total sales since February 2010 have increased by 12 per cent. The move will also see former Asda executive Tony Campbell step down from Hobbs after [...]
Young, hopeful and about to start boosting growth rates January 12, 2011 FOR MUCH of the last two decades, the Chinese economy has astonished investors and worried politicians. Growth of an average of 9.3 per cent has been driven by an astonishing bout of domestic investment. But it has also been helped on by an immense “demographic dividend”, engineered by the country’s one child policy. But with [...]
Rising export markets give morale boost January 12, 2011 BRITISH exports rose by 4.1 per cent (£0.9bn) in November, official data showed yesterday, as a separate survey revealed buoyant confidence among exporting companies. Overall the UK’s trade deficit edged upwards to £4.1bn, but only because of rocketing oil prices and erratic items, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said. Excluding these elements, exports rose [...]
Industry growth in Eurozone January 12, 2011 INDUSTRIAL production rose across the Eurozone in November, it was announced yesterday, on a day of good economic data for the single currency area. Production increased by 1.2 per cent on the previous month, a far greater jump than had been expected by economists. The annual rate of production growth rose from 7.1 per cent [...]
US budget gap narrows to $80bn for December January 12, 2011 THE United States posted an $80bn (£50.7bn) budget deficit in December, slightly smaller than economists had expected, Treasury Department data showed yesterday. The December deficit was narrower than December 2009’s gap of $91bn. The government has now posted a budget deficit for 27 straight months, the longest streak on record, the Treasury Department said. A [...]
