Roundtable Discussion; The Future of Mineral Sands. Watch the video here.
Another excellent set of results - clearly the business is extremely well run and going from strength to strength in the UK and Germany - good to see that Germany is likely to break even this trading year.
Clearly an excellent Christmas trading period for M&S, even if some of the higher expectations wen't met.
This is only part one though, we still await the Ocado Retail results - due on Tuesday 16th Jan.
Its interesting to note how normally sane investors and traders turn into sheep on results day.
The thing is Neil - I don't think the discounters have a possible plan B - its all about price.
Its difficult to see how they can innovate.
I think that Tesco's, Sainsburys and Asda have them in their sights - they just need to go in for the kill.
It should be exiting to watch!
Neil
I think the German retailers have backed themselves into a corner that has now developed into a situation outside their control.
Customers are quickly realising that they can buy products for about the same price at other supermarkets and they can also get a better range from other supermarkets.
The other supermarkets are sacrificing margins on basic products from the discounters range and getting better margins on more up market products and branded goods - hence they remain profitable.
As the economy improves I think this trend will become more obvious and the discounters will start to loose market share and will remain loss making with debts of £3 billion becoming problematic for Lidl.
I think the SP got ahead of itself when the market was performing well, now that the market is more subdued the fizz has been knocked back.
The numbers have now been so widely trailed that they are more or less included in the SP.
Any movement tomorrow will probably reflect general market sentiment.
Then the SP will continue to rise ahead of the market throughout 2024, if the macro allows.
New figures from research group NIQ for the 12 weeks till the end of December have food sales at M&S up 12.1% behind Lidl on 15.3%.
***** Then followed by Aldi on 11.4% and OCADO, very encouragingly on 10.8%
The rest follow in single figures with Waitrose on just 3.6% - clearly loosing out to M&S and Ocado.
It looks a modest return to profitability for Ocado Retail could be recorded in the update this month - this would give the SP a huge boost.
Full story is here.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/food-sales-soar-as-marks-spencer-enjoys-a-bumper-christmas/ar-AA1mItRJ?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=6c94be77471547f4a4730430663cc0f7&ei=21
New figures from research group NIQ for the 12 weeks till the end of December have food sales at M&S up 12.1% behind Lidl on 15.3%.
Then followed by Aldi on 11.4% and Ocado, very encouragingly on 10.8%
The rest follow in single figures with Waitrose on just 3.6% - clearly loosing out to M&S.
Full story is here.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/food-sales-soar-as-marks-spencer-enjoys-a-bumper-christmas/ar-AA1mItRJ?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=6c94be77471547f4a4730430663cc0f7&ei=21
Yes, 0.5% from Mail is incorrect - they have their own agenda to create imaginary rift between M&S and Ocado.
5.5% growth is very respectable - market share is partly constrained by capacity in some areas.
Caution is needed interpreting this 0.5% figure in that we don't know what it exactly relates to.
Read last years Trading Update for context.
Also capacity could be an issue.
https://www.lse.co.uk/rns/OCDO/trading-statement-tj0mpbmllsmz95p.html
According to the Daily Mail Christmas Sales are up just 0.5% for Ocado Retail - these are, they say, unpublished figures from Kantar.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/marks-spencer-is-crowned-king-after-high-street-food-fight/ar-AA1myRaC?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=f45a9fa0d71541a29129fd4ac3634078&ei=15
Daily Mail have 14.2% - unpublished from Kantar - Christmas food sales for M&S.
Just 0.5% for Ocado Retail.
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/money/other/marks-spencer-is-crowned-king-after-high-street-food-fight/ar-AA1myRaC?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=f45a9fa0d71541a29129fd4ac3634078&ei=15
Hello spindok
The general trend with AIM companies at the moment seems to be that those that are trading well just have a static SP.
With the rest of the market also in the doldrums, I think we need to see an improvement in the FTSE100 and 250 before AIM picks up.
Happy new year.
Mr Profit
COMPARE THIS!!!
https://www.sharecast.com/equity/Ceres_Power_Holdings-13797/director-deals
Well spotted Mr Profit.
Hanwha asset management are based in South Korea.
No idea how they built up that percentage holding unnoticed - Weichai and Bosch holdings seem to be unchanged.
Maybe something is happening with the Doosan partnership project in South Korea? - could be interesting!!!
NASDAQ Futures have fallen back by about 500 points so far this trading year.
I think from an overbought position.
NASDAQ Futures tend to guide OCDO's SP, hence the fall back - probably temporary.
Other tech companies have also fallen back.
I think we need to see a general rise in small cap AIM stocks before we see an appreciable rise here.
There seems to be a good number of very good little companies that trade on AIM that have been held down by the general gloom surrounding the whole market - mainly because of high interest rates.
Hopefully 2024 will be about identifying these opportunities, sorting the wheat from the chaff, and capitalising on them.
I think we need to see a general rise in small cap AIM stocks before we see an appreciable rise here.
There seems to be a good number of very good little companies that trade on AIM that have been held down by the general gloom surrounding the whole market - mainly because of high interest rates.
Hopefully 2024 will be about identifying these opportunities, sorting the wheat from the chaff, and capitalising on them.