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LONDON, June 17 (Reuters) - Home improvement group
Kingfisher said its underlying sales jumped 21.8%
year-on-year in its second quarter to June 13 as its European
stores emerged from coronavirus lockdowns, encouraging people to
take on do-it-yourself projects.
Kingfisher, which owns B&Q and Screwfix in Britain and
Castorama and Brico Depot in France and other markets, said it
could not provide specific guidance for its 2020-21 year given
the uncertainty around the pandemic.
The group has seen an improving relative sales trend, with
like-for-like sales moving from being down 74% in the first week
of April to over 25% up since the second week of May.
All of Kingfisher's UK and French stores were closed for
in-store purchases from March 23 and 15 respectively, though
click and collect and home delivery options were made available.
It gradually re-opened its UK and French stores in the second
half of April.
It said it has seen a fourfold increase in e-commerce sales
since mid-March.
The group has taken steps to reduce costs, preserve cash and
boost liquidity to get it through the crisis. As at June 12 it
had access to over 3 billion pounds ($3.8 billion) of cash,
providing significant liquidity headroom.
For its year to Jan. 31, Kingfisher reported adjusted pretax
profit down 5.2% to 544 million pounds on total sales down 1.5%
to 11.5 billion pounds.
Statutory pretax profit fell 65.7% to 103 million pounds
after it took 441 million pounds of exceptional items, largely
reflecting impairments for its stores and Russia.
The group said in March it would not pay a final dividend.
($1 = 0.7955 pounds)
(Reporting by James Davey; editing by Kate Holton)