Ted Baker - are we set to find a base?

Thursday, 6th December 2018 09:28 - by Rajan Dhall

The company have really struggled this year with the high street taking a massive knock. Not only has the company suffered after 'Hug Gate' performance has been way below par. Here are some of the highlights from the latest trading update:

• 0.2% (0.4% in constant currency) decrease in Group revenue for the 16 week period from 11 August 2018 to 1 December 2018 (the "period"), compared to the same period last year
• Total retail sales including e-commerce increased by 2.3% (2.1% in constant currency) for the period and average retail square footage rose by 5.2% to 427,586 sq.ft (2017: 406,258 sq.ft)
• E-commerce sales, which are an integral and increasingly important component within our retail channel, increased by 18.0% (15.3% in constant currency) and represented 30.3% (2017: 26.3%) of total retail sales for the period
• Total retail sales for the last eight weeks of the period increased by 4.0% as the weather became more typical for the season
• Wholesale sales for the period decreased by 6.5% (7.0% in constant currency) due to the earlier timing of wholesale deliveries in the first half of the year
• Total retail sales for the last eight weeks of the period increased by 4.0% as the weather became more typical for the season.

The chart is fairly hard to analyse to be honest, the massive falls means we are looking at support levels from 2013 and even slightly before. Looking at the volume and the OBV indicator you can see selling pressure still persists but the hard part is finding what the market perceives as 'value' at these lower levels. For now, 1309p is the base and we could continue to hold unless the allegation against the founder Ray Kelvin become more serious. For this one keep an eye on the headlines but in terms of sales, it seems the company are doing the right thing by expanding into other nations and towards the digital sector.