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Supermarket giant Tesco (LON:TSCO) delivered an impressive set of third-quarter results with sales growth picking up sharply during the key Christmas trading period, as it upped its profit guidance for the full year. The country's biggest grocer said like-for-like sales increased by 6.6% across the group in the three months to 25 November, with UK LFL sales up 7.9%, ahead of the Citi estimate of 7.5% growth. In the six weeks to 6 January, UK LFL sales were 6.8% higher than last year, which includes growth of 9.2% in the four weeks to Christmas. As a result of the stronger-than-estimated performance, the retailer raised its adjusted operating profit forecast for the year to £2.75bn, ahead of the previous guidance of £2.6-2.7bn.
UK retailer Marks & Spencer (LON:MKS) said it expected to deliver annual results in line with expectations despite higher-than-expected cost increases as it reported an 8.1% rise in sales over the key Christmas quarter driven by food revenue and womenswear. The company said UK sales came in at £3.56bn in the 13 weeks to December 30. Food sales rose 9.9% as supply chain constraints eased, while clothing and homewares were up 4.8%, mainly due to price rises and fewer discounts.
Informa (LON:INF) said in a trading update on Thursday that it expected to report 2023 underlying revenue growth of 30%, reported revenue of £3.17bn, adjusted operating profit of £845m and free cash flow of £600m. The company said it was targeting high single-digit underlying revenue growth for 2024, with reported revenue of between £3.44bn and £3.48bn and adjusted operating profit of £945m to £965m. Informa also announced the combination of Informa Tech's digital businesses with US-based TechTarget to create a leading platform in B2B digital services.
Newspaper round-up
Pressure is mounting on the government to review more than £2bn in new contracts awarded to Fujitsu since a court ruling in 2019 found its Horizon IT system caused accounting errors that were blamed on more than 900 post office operators who were then wrongly prosecuted by the Post Office. The Japanese company, which continues to hold the prestigious status of being a key “strategic supplier” making more than £100m annually from government work despite the scandal, has won 101 new contracts worth £2.04bn since the landmark legal ruling. – Guardian
The US transportation secretary announced on Wednesday afternoon that no grounded Boeing (NYSE:BA) 737 Max 9 would return to service “until it is safe”, after Alaska Airlines announced the cancellation of all flights on its 737 Max 9 planes at the direction of the Federal Aviation Administration. Pete Buttigieg said he was “not putting a timeline” on when the FAA will allow the planes to resume flights. – Guardian
Funds that allow Bitcoin to be traded more easily have been approved for the first time by Wall Street’s regulator in a hotly anticipated move. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced on Wednesday evening that it had authorised the trading of a number of Bitcoin exchange traded funds, while refusing to endorse them as a good investment. – Telegraph
Poppy Gustafsson, the boss of Darktrace (LON:DARK), looks set to face fresh questions about more than 100 deals she was involved with while working in the accounts department at Autonomy, as she is drawn into the US criminal trial of Mike Lynch, the Cambridge technology entrepreneur. The deals include multimillion-dollar transactions with household names including JP Morgan, BP (LON:BP), Deutsche Bank (ETR:DBKGn) and Tottenham Hotspur FC in a far more extensive list put forward by the prosecution than the 21 deals originally outlined last October. – The Times
The boss of a company that helps to fund charities has attacked a legal system that allows Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou to bring endless “bullying” lawsuits. James Moir, the chief executive of easyfundraising, said his business had been served with a “ludicrous” High Court claim from the billionaire easyJet (LON:EZJ) founder over the use of the “easy” name, which he said could cost “towards £1 million” to fight. – The Times
US close
After a tentative start, US stocks finished with decent gains on Wednesday with the S&P 500 inching ever closer to its record high, though market sentiment was still cautious ahead of latest inflation figures due out the following session.
The Dow finished 0.5% higher, the Nasdaq rose 0.8%, while the S&P 500 gained 0.6% to 4,783.45, just a handful of points away from the all-time high of 4,796.56 reached in January 2022.
Investors were looking ahead to the latest consumer price index report, due out on Thursday, with economists expecting to see CPI rising 3.2% year-on-year in December, up from 3.1% the month before.
Core inflation, however, is expected to ease to 3.8% from 4.0%.
Market participants will thumb over the data in search of any hints as to exactly when the central bank may see fit to start cutting interest rates, with expectations being reeled back in recent days.