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 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."

Good time to short this one. Perhaps further to fall, with the update next week.

Had a good run since July, maybe pushing my luck a wee bit but gone long on the spreads @ 250.40p.

Trading Statement Wednesday, target 270p tight stop.

LATEST BROKER VIEWS

Date Broker New target Recomm.
26 Sep Jefferies... 250.00 Hold
26 Sep Credit Suisse 315.00 Outperform
21 Sep Deutsche Bank 280.00 Buy
21 Sep Barclays... 270.00 Equal weight
20 Sep Exane BNP... 265.00 Outperform
14 Sep Exane BNP... 265.00 Outperform
14 Sep Barclays... 270.00 Equal weight
31 Aug Citigroup N/A Neutral
24 Aug Deutsche Bank 280.00 Buy
5 Aug Exane BNP... 260.00 Outperform

Not sure if 270 is on the cards anytime soon.

Take bits out of statement that suits your remit.

Holding at the moment.

Guess so Claret, got out of s/bet at the open. On watch list though.

confess i have avoided all supermarkets for a year or more
i think they're a total disaster sector

you might want to look at GNK as this late hot spell we've being having must surely help their next set of figures

Think SBRY better placed than Asda at mo. Depends what impact if any, on Argos takeover.

as i said above, i wouldn't want any supermarket group in my portfolio, nor M&S which is a total disaster

Agree with sentiment on Supermarkets. But still made a decent profit at SBRY.

Some support @ 240p and if sp manages to stay above 50DMA hope springs eternal. Glass half full for now.

Held steady and now back above 25DMA. For how long who knows, but at least that's September out of the way.

LATEST BROKER VIEWS

Date Broker New target Recomm.
29 Sep Beaufort... N/A Hold
29 Sep Exane BNP... 265.00 Outperform
29 Sep Deutsche Bank N/A Buy
29 Sep HSBC 185.00 Reduce
28 Sep Shore Capital N/A Under Review
26 Sep Jefferies... 250.00 Hold
26 Sep Credit Suisse 315.00 Outperform
21 Sep Deutsche Bank 280.00 Buy
21 Sep Barclays... 270.00 Equal weight
20 Sep Exane BNP... 265.00 Outperform

A few good days. Looking for 280p

Looking good.

Interim results next Wenesday 9th November.

Tanked.

Third Quarter Trading Statement for the 15 weeks to 7 January 2017

Good Christmas performance as customers choose Sainsbury's for quality, choice and value

· Sainsbury's: Total Retail sales1 up 0.8 per cent (excl. fuel) and like-for-like Retail sales up 0.1 per cent (excl. fuel), with total volumes up and like-for-like volumes flat

· Argos: Total sales up 4.1 per cent and like-for-like sales up 4.0 per cent

· Combined Sainsbury's and Argos like-for-like sales up 1.0 per cent (excl. fuel)

more.....