Sainbury issued a promising trading statement last week but why no mention of margins? It's not alone with all the other multiples reluctant to cover margins in their quarterly updates. Good see that Marks gives them a mention.
Commentary at www.investorschampion.com

Sainsbury's leapfrogs Asda to become UK's second-largest supermakert as Aldi and Lidl go from strength to strength




http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/news/article-2908159/Sainsbury-s-beats-Asda-2nd-biggest-supermarket.html

Sharecast -


Sainsbury's to cut 500 jobs in discounter price war

Tue, 13 January 2015


Sainsbury's will slash 500 jobs from store support centres in an effort to cut costs and compete with the discounters.
The supermarket's plan is to save £500m over the next three years, now that new chief executive Mike Coupe is at the helm.

According to the superstore, this plan will "streamline our central divisions and bring our supermarkets and convenience businesses together".

Losing 500 members of its 161,000 strong staff seems like it will be the firm's first move this year.

Coupe told staff in a recent letter: "I recognise that these changes will be difficult for our colleagues and I can assure you the decision to make them was not taken lightly."

"However, I'm certain that we will be in a stronger position to deliver our new strategy and better equipped to win in these times of change as a result."

This is the latest news in the ongoing supermarket price war that has seen the price of milk drop below bottled water in some cases.

shorted attempt to close yesterday gap at 269 at the open,nice stop just above 274.5. it fires up 10 min ago freaking nicely.

gone nicely, collapsed risk.

Both these & TSCO up 3.9% today ahead of SBRY reporting tomorrow.

Trading Statement

Fourth Quarter Trading Statement for the ten weeks to 14 March 2015

Positive response to price investment as volume and like-for-like transactions increase

· Total Retail sales for fourth quarter down 0.3 per cent (excl fuel), down 2.7 per cent (inc fuel)

· Like-for-like Retail sales for fourth quarter down 1.9 per cent (excl fuel), down 3.9 per cent (inc fuel)

· Over 1,100 prices reduced since we announced our £150 million price investment

· Volume increases across the business as new customers discover our great value

Clarification on Egyptian legal case

We are aware of media coverage today outlining a legal case in Egypt brought against our Chief Executive Mike Coupe. This relates to a historic commercial dispute in which Mike Coupe had no involvement and we strongly refute all the allegations.

Mike Coupe was not employed by Sainsbury's at the time of the original business deal in 2001 and has never met the complainant.

When Mr El Nasharty bought our interest in the Egyptian joint venture we had with him in 2001, he paid us with cheques that were dishonoured. Mr El Nasharty is now claiming that Mike was in Egypt on 15th July 2014 and seized these cheques, which is an impossibility. Mike Coupe was in London carrying out his normal duties that day. In September 2014 Mike Coupe was convicted, without notice of the proceedings against him and in his absence, in an Egyptian Court. We have taken all necessary steps to appeal against these groundless claims and will continue to do so.

This process is being handled by our legal team and we do not anticipate it having any material operational or financial impact on the company.

Final Results

Financial summary
· Underlying Group sales(1) (inc VAT) down 0.9 per cent to £26,122 million (2013/14: £26,353 million)
· Retail sales (inc VAT, ex fuel) down 0.2 per cent
· Like-for-like sales (inc VAT, ex fuel) down 1.9 per cent
· Underlying profit before tax(2) down 14.7 per cent to £681 million (2013/14: £798 million)
· Underlying basic earnings per share(3) down 19.5 per cent to 26.4 pence (2013/14: 32.8 pence)
· Return on capital employed(4) of 9.7 per cent (2013/14: 11.3 per cent)
· Return on capital employed excluding pension fund deficit of 9.0 per cent (2013/14: 10.4 per cent)

Statutory
· Group sales (ex VAT, inc fuel) down 0.7 per cent to £23,775 million (2013/14: £23,949 million)
· Items excluded from underlying results total a charge of £753 million (2013/14: £100 million credit), including an impairment and onerous contract charge of £628 million (2013/14: £92 million charge)
· Loss before tax of £72 million (2013/14: £898 million profit)
· Basic loss per share 8.7 pence (2013/14: 37.7 pence earnings per share)
· Proposed full-year dividend 13.2 pence per share, down 23.7 per cent, cover 2.0 times (2013/14: 17.3 pence per share, cover 1.9 times)

Operational Highlights

Great products and services at fair prices
· We are investing in lowering prices on products where customers have told us that price is most important. We have never been more competitive on price versus our competition and are seeing encouraging early signs of volume and transaction growth
· Our programme to improve the quality of 3,000 own-brand products that matter most to our customers is well under way and customers will see more of our improved product ranges over the coming year
· General merchandise and clothing are performing strongly, with sales up over nine per cent
· Sainsbury's Bank delivered sales and profit growth, with operating profit up 17 per cent to £62 million. We are making good progress against our transition plan albeit total capital costs associated with the transition are expected to increase by between £80 million and £120 million

There for our customers
· We have identified sites for our new convenience and supermarket format trials, as we look to make our customer shopping experience easier and more convenient
· We opened 98 convenience stores during the year and delivered over 16 per cent convenience sales growth. We continue to open one to two convenience stores per week
· Groceries online delivered growth in the number of customer orders of 13 per cent, and we have invested in our platform to improve service and availability

Colleagues making the difference
· We restructured the way we work at our store support centres to improve efficiencies, reducing the number of roles by 500. In April 2015, we also announced a restructure of our stores to improve efficiency and customer service, which we expect to result in around 800 fewer roles
· We are developing digital hubs in London and Coventry, creating 480 specialist roles
· We continue to invest in colleague training and development. We won 'Training Initiative of the Year' at the Retail Industry Awards for a programme designed to improve operational outcomes and customer experience

We know our customers better than anyone else
· Our customer insight remains a source of competitive advantage and allows us to reward our customers in a personalised way
· In April 2015, we changed the way we reward our Nectar customers, reducing the number of points earned but introducing more high-value bonus events

Our values make us different
· Our values remain a key component of our differentiated offer and we will continue to focus on areas that our customers care about
· We received our second consecutive Green Retailer of the Year award at the 2014 Grocer Gold Awards. Amongst other environmental initiatives, our Triple Zero stores and CO2 refrigerated vehicles were recognised

Maintaining balance sheet strength
· We have taken decisive action to maintain our balance sheet strength and maximise our cash position, to ensure we remain fit for the future and are able to capitalise on our many growth opportunities
· We have delivered operating cost savings of £140 million in 2014/15 and expect to deliver total operating cost savings of £500 million over the next three years
· Core retail capital expenditure(5) was £947 million in 2014/15. We will reduce core retail capital expenditure to between £500 million and £550 million per annum in each of the next three years. The allocation of our capital expenditure is also changing to reflect our strategy
· The value of our property has decreased during the year by £0.9 billion to £11.1 billion, mainly due to a reduction in market rental values
· We have improved retail working capital by more than £300 million as a result of operational efficiencies
· We have an affordable dividend policy and have fixed cover at 2.0 times our underlying earnings

more....

Trading Statement tomorrow - Financial Calendar

1st Quarter Results

Perhaps a good time to think about shorting. Look over bought. Discounters still eating away at margins. The Christmas competition is going to be fierce.

Sainsbury returns to H1 pretax profit as sales fall

StockMarketWire.com

Sainsbury has returns to profit by posting H1 pretax earnings to GBP339m, from a year-ago loss of GBP290m. Interim dividend was 4p a share. Like-for-like sales, including VAT but excluding fuel, were down 1.6%.

It said underlying group sales, including VAT, were down 2% to GBP13.64bn.

CEO Mike Coupe said:

"We are making good progress against the strategy we outlined last November. We are delivering volume and transaction growth as customers value our quality improvements and our clearer, simpler message of lower regular prices.

"To complement our core food offer of great quality and inspiring food, sold at fair prices, we are delivering on our strategy to expand our non-food businesses with further growth in clothing, general merchandise and Sainsbury's Bank.

"Our strategy of investing to ensure customers can shop with us across multiple channels remains a strategic advantage. Shopping at Sainsbury's is now more convenient than ever for our customers and we are able to reward them for their loyalty.

"We continue to run the business efficiently and our cost savings programme is ahead of plan. We now expect savings of around £225 million by the end of this financial year and we are on track to deliver our target of £500 million cost savings over the next three years."

Easy short from the open on those figures out today.

If it doesn't bounce on 50DMA big gap to fill to 230p.

supermarkets-tough-christmas-pressure-discounters-mounts

Company News



Tue, 17 November 2015


Sainsbury's gains share as discounters claim fifth of grocery market, says Kantar



Sainsbury (J) Quote more






Price: 248.40

Chg: 5.20

Chg %: 2.14%

Date: 17:00



FTSE 100 Quote


Price: 6,268.76 Chg: 122.38 Chg %: 1.99% Date: 17:14

(ShareCast News) - Discounters Aldi and Lidl have reached a combined share of 10% of the British grocery market for the first time, while Sainsbury's became the first major supermarket to claim a market share increase for over a year.
The overall grocery market remained slow in the 12 weeks to 8 November, with sales up by 0.5% according to data from industry research house Kantar Worldpanel, down from the 0.8% announced a month ago.

Revenues continue to be held back by the fierce price war that saw prices down by 1.7% on a like-for-like basis.

Sainsbury's market share increasing by 0.2 percentage points to 16.6% thanks to a 1.5% increase in sales and, as a food-focused retailer, the company traditionally increases its market share over Christmas so could increase its share further by the end of the year.

Sales fell at the rest of the major retailers, with Tesco down by 2.5% and Morrisons sales falling 1.7%.

Asda sales declined 3.5% but the WalMart-owned chain recently announced a slimlined product range, further price investment and increasing click-and-collect opportunities in its stores.

But the continuing rise of the discounters remains a concern for the 'big four', signalling no end to the price battle.

"If you look back as recently as 2012 Aldi and Lidl only held a 5% share of the market, and it had previously taken them nine years to double their combined share from 2.5%," said Fraser McKevitt, head of retail and consumer insight at Kantar.

He noted that in the last 12 weeks the two retailers have attracted another additional million shoppers compared with last year while average spend per trip has increased by 4% to £18.85, which is 78p ahead of the total retailer average.

"The discounters show no sign of stopping and with plans to open hundreds of stores between them, they'll noticeably widen their reach to the British population."

Lidl's market share reached a new record high of 4.4%, increasing by 0.7 percentage points on last year thanks to a sales growth of 19%.

Aldi grew sales by 16.5%, keeping its market share at 5.6% for the fifth consecutive month.

StockMarketWire.com
Sainsbury's confirmed it made an approach in November to Home Retail regarding a possible offer for the Group and that this approach was rejected but that it is considering its position.

Home Retail said the approach both undervalued the company and its long-term prospects.

Sainsbury continued:
"Over the last year, Sainsbury's has been working in partnership with Home Retail Group trialling a number of Argos concessions in Sainsbury's stores. The Board of Sainsbury's believes the combination of Sainsbury's and Home Retail Group is an attractive proposition for the customers and shareholders of both companies, establishing a platform for long-term value creation. The combination is an opportunity to bring together two of the UK's leading retail businesses, with complementary product offers, focused on delivering quality products and services at fair prices, through an integrated, multi-channel proposition.

Specifically, the Board of Sainsbury's believes a combination of Home Retail Group and Sainsbury's will:

- Create a food and non-food retailer of choice for customers, building on the strong heritages of both businesses whose brands are renowned for trust, quality, value and customer service;

- Deliver profitable sales growth by offering customers the right combination of location, range, speed and flexibility, across a wide range of products;

- Bring together multi-channel capabilities and delivery networks for fast, flexible and reliable delivery to store or to home across a wide range of food and non-food products;

- Optimise the use of their combined retail space. The combined entity would have attractively located stores across the UK, with an enhanced supply and delivery network and a strong presence across food and grocery, clothing, homewares, toys, stationery, electricals, furniture and other general merchandise;

- Create a financial services proposition that will provide a wider range of customer-centric services including credit cards, loans, deposits, insurance and ATMs;

- Deliver revenue synergy potential through the ability to sell to each other's customers, including the operation of Argos concessions within Sainsbury's stores, and the sale of Sainsbury's products and services through Argos's network;

- Provide additional cost synergy potential through property rationalisation, scale benefits and operational efficiencies.

Sainsbury's reserves the right to introduce other forms of consideration and/or vary the mix of consideration. In accordance with Rule 2.6(a) of the Code, Sainsbury's must, by not later than 5.00 p.m. on 2 February 2016, either announce a firm intention to make an offer for Home Retail Group in accordance with Rule 2.7 of the Code or announce that it does not intend to make an offer for Home Retail Group, in which case the announcement will be treated as a statement to which Rule 2.8 of the Code applies. This deadline will only be extended with the consent of Home Retail Group and the Takeover Panel in accordance with Rule 2.6(c) of the Code." At 12:31pm

3rd Qt. Trading statement http://www.moneyam.com/action/news/showArticle?id=5191945

Sainsbury's and Home Retail have come to an agreement over the terms of a deal that values the Argos owner at about £1.3bn. Home Retail shareholders will receive 55p in cash and 0.321 Sainsbury's shares for each of their Home shares, plus
a 2.8p in lieu of a final dividend in respect of the financial year ending 27 February.

SBRY's total underlying Q4 sales rise

StockMarketWire.com

Sainsbury said, in a Q4 trading statement, that total retail sales excluding fuel rose 1.2%, but were up 0.5% if fuel was included. Q4 like-for-like retail sales rose 0.1% excluding fuel, but fell 0.4% including fuel.

FY total retail sales excluding fuel were up 0.4%, but on a like-for-like basis fell 0.9%. Including fuel, total sales fell 1.2% and like-for-like sales fell 2.5%.

CEO Mike Coupe said:

"We have delivered a strong performance this quarter. Our supermarkets recorded both like-for-like transaction and volume growth and we continue to exceed our internal metrics for service and availability.

"We also maintained our market share in the quarter. The market will remain competitive as food deflation continues to impact sales growth.

"We are progressing well with our quality investment in 3,000 own-brand products. The New Year is traditionally a time when customers focus on healthy eating and to cater for this demand we launched a number of vegetable-based product innovations including boodles (butternut squash noodles) and courgetti (spiralized courgette) which are proving extremely popular with our customers.

"We also introduced new lines to our healthier bread range including the rye loaf and sprouting grain boule, both of which are high in fibre.

"Our promotional participation levels continue to reduce year-on-year, running at an average of 28 per cent for the quarter[2]. Customers have told us that multi-buy promotions do not meet their shopping needs today.

"They are often viewed as confusing, create storage challenges and unnecessary waste. In response to this, we recently announced that we will be phasing out the vast majority of our multi-buy promotions across grocery products by August this year.

"We will continue to simplify our trading strategy in favour of lower regular prices. We are also committed to reducing waste and in January we launched our Waste less, Save more initiative in Swadlincote, Derbyshire. The town will receive �1 million to trial the latest technology and innovations in reducing household waste.

"Our in-store operational metrics for service and availability remain excellent and are beating our internal targets. Year-to-date we have won 16 Grocer 33 Service & Availability awards, ahead of our run-rate in the previous year.

"We opened 16 convenience stores including our second micro store in Richmond. Groceries online sales grew at nearly 14 per cent and orders by nearly 19 per cent. We simplified our online nectar redemption process, making it easier for customers to redeem their points, and improving the online customer experience.

"Clothing delivered over ten per cent growth and we introduced our 22nd Gok Wan collection which had its best ever February launch. Entertainment also performed well, with nearly 11 per cent growth driven by some big releases in the quarter.

"Sainsbury's Bank continued its good performance with 15 per cent volume growth in Insurance new business and 12 per cent growth in Travel Money in-store transaction volumes.

"We have traded well this year and are making excellent progress implementing our strategy. The market will remain competitive but we are confident that we will continue to outperform our major peers."