Tesco is one of the worlds leading international retailers. Since the company first the trading name of Tesco, in the mid 1920s, the group has expanded into different formats, different markets and different sectors. The UKs leading retailer Tesco was floated on the stock exchange in 1947 and in 1995 took over rival Sainsburys position as the UK number one. The principal activity of the group is food retailing, with over 2,000 stores worldwide. Tesco has a long term strategy for growth, based on four key parts: growth in the Core UK business, to expand by growing internationally, to be as strong in non-food as in food and to follow customers into new retailing services. The company launched a home shopping service in 2000, allowing customers to order their shopping online. Tesco is now expanding its convenience stores and overseas into areas such as Taiwan, Malaysia, Poland, the US and Ireland.

Upper graph = 12 month share price with 6 month moving average
Lower graph = 12 month volume (red line = volume average).

And down again 1.9% after HSBC says "Underweight" from Neutral" although sainsburys is down as well and they have fallen 2.3%
Apart from the HSBC announcement can't see any reason for the fall.
Skinny, you'll know what the reason is!
TT
(;-))

I think this sort of press reporting isn't helping :-

Tesco boss faces flak over trading figures

And the fact that over the weekend, I had decided to sell some of my holding!

I started buying my custard tarts from Morrisons ,that would'nt help either !

As it's confession time, I boycotted this lot in the 70's as well... Sorry chaps -):

Q3 Interim Management Statement

THIRD QUARTER INTERIM MANAGEMENT STATEMENT

· Group sales growth of +0.6%
· UK sales growth of +0.9%
o Like-for-like sales decreased by (1.5)%, driven by a weaker grocery market
o Further progress towards Building a Better Tesco in the UK, including finest* re-launch, and 108 more stores upgraded as part of our continuing Refresh programme
o Multichannel focus delivering record online grocery orders and positive LFL in Express
· International conditions remain challenging, particularly in Thailand and Ireland; our businesses in Poland and Turkey are showing better trends

Philip Clarke - Chief Executive

"Continuing pressures on UK household finances have made the grocery market more challenging for everyone since the summer and our third quarter performance reflects this. The actions we have taken to position the business for the future - including the work currently underway to transform our general merchandise offer and our decision to significantly reduce the amount of new space we open - are also holding back our sales performance in the short-term.

Customers are continuing to respond positively to the changes we are making to the UK business to differentiate our offer and position Tesco as a multichannel leader. These include the re-launch of finest*, over 100 more store refreshes in the quarter and further investment into our fast-growing online grocery service.

Overseas, the near-term trading environment also remains tough, most notably in Thailand, but we have been able to drive a better performance in Poland and Turkey following the actions taken in the first half.

We are confident that our strategic priorities - strengthening the UK business, establishing multichannel leadership and ensuring capital discipline - are the right ones and that they will drive long-term value and returns."

Group sales

Group sales for the thirteen weeks ending 23 November 2013 increased by 0.6% at actual exchange rates and by 0.2% at constant rates, excluding petrol. Including petrol, Group sales decreased by (0.8)% at actual exchange rates and by (1.2)% at constant rates.

UK performance

Total sales in the UK, including VAT and excluding petrol, increased by 0.9%. Like-for-like sales, excluding both VAT and petrol, decreased by (1.5)% for the quarter. The change in performance from Q2 to Q3 is broadly in-line with the weaker growth seen in the UK grocery market as a whole. Consumers are still managing the effects of an unprecedented period of declining real incomes and a higher cost of living; the average spending power of a typical UK household is around 10% below its 2007 peak, in real terms.

Despite the challenging backdrop, our work to Build a Better Tesco for customers in the UK has continued - improving our core customer proposition and doing more to differentiate our offer from that of our competitors. As just some examples of this work, we successfully completed the re-launch of our finest* product range and we have individually tailored the range of each one of our 1,600 Express stores to the needs of their local areas. We refreshed over 1.8 million square feet of existing space in the quarter and recent sales uplifts are continuing to outperform average results for the programme to date.

We have also continued with our work to transform our general merchandise business. This has once again held back top-line growth but supported our trading margin, as we migrate from categories with a low level of profitability to more productive, sustainable categories such as Home, Cook & Dine, Papershop and Celebration.

Our work to position Tesco as the leading multichannel retailer remains a strategic priority. Alongside our continuing efforts to better position our large-store portfolio for the future, we have now rolled out one-hour grocery home delivery slots to over 98% of the UK population, we have more than 200 grocery Click & Collect drive-through locations in our stores and have also started a number of trials in non-store locations. Last week saw the official launch of our sixth grocery dotcom centre in Erith. Enhancing our multichannel and digital strategy, the customer response to the launch of our Hudl tablet has been very strong, with over 300,000 units sold to date. This is more than we had originally planned to sell in total in the run-up to Christmas. Hudl has also received critical acclaim as one of the best-value tablets on the market.

International performance

Total sales in Asia grew by 1.1% at actual exchange rates and by 0.5% at constant rates. Like-for-like sales in Asia declined by (5.1)%. The change versus the second quarter is driven by two factors. First, our Korean business - as expected - experienced a greater year-on-year impact from the regulatory restrictions on opening hours in the third quarter. Second, underlying improvements in the performance of our business in Thailand were more than offset by a tougher comparative, in addition to increasingly challenging conditions for consumers.

Total sales in Europe excluding petrol declined by (1.0)% at actual exchange rates and by (2.9)% at constant rates. Our like-for-like sales performance for the region as a whole improved slightly from the second quarter, at (4.0)%. In Ireland, our performance continues to reflect extremely challenging conditions for consumers, compounded by a more intense competitive environment. Our recent introduction of Price Promise in Ireland will help to improve customer perceptions of our relative price position, allowing us to emphasise points of differentiation in our offer. In Poland, following our decision to invest in our offer during the first half, our like-for-like sales performance has improved markedly, despite increased competitor activity. Turkey also saw an improved performance, with the business continuing to benefit from additional focus.

Tesco Bank

Sales at Tesco Bank increased by 0.9%, with an increase in interest income from strong lending growth offset by reduced fee income across our insurance business. We remain on track to complete our full range of banking products with the launch of current accounts in the first half of next year.

Outlook

Despite the challenging conditions in many of our markets, we are performing in line with market expectations* for the full year.

Credit Suisse Outperform 341.33 420.00 420.00 Reiterates

Skinny, I'd be quite happy if Tesco got to 420. It's just a pity that the rest of the analysts all think that it is overvalued and underperforming. Having been well in profit I am now in a slight loss but always intended this as a recovery play. If it falls a lot more then I'll add to my holding. It may be out of favour right now but I can't believe that will always be the case.
And, as for profits in my portfolio, "Every little counts"! (;-))

Yes - I agree :-)

CS yesterday, the rest today :-


Beaufort Securities Hold 335.70 - - Reiterates

Citigroup Neutral 335.70 350.00 330.00 Reiterates

JP Morgan Cazenove Underweight 335.70 315.00 315.00 Reiterates

Nomura Neutral 335.70 370.00 360.00 Reiterates

Deutsche Bank Buy 335.70 386.00 386.00 Retains

Supermarket stocks were under pressure today on the back of Tesco's disappointing third-quarter results yesterday, which showed that its like-for-like sales performance in the UK had deteriorated. Analysts at Panmure Gordon downgraded Tesco today from 'buy' to 'hold', saying that the company's continued market share loss and strong growth online "must [...] inevitably put pressure on core store profits".



Time to buy.

Chart looking grim, Santa rally who knows, got to be worth a punt in @ 325 on the spreads for if nothing else a dead cat bounce. Tight stop 10 pips.

From an investing point of view, starting to look interesting. 310p on the cards imo.

I have been in this from about 315ish and topped up some time ago at 330.
Still holding and a pity that I didn't sell some 4 or 5 weeks ago, but, if it drops back even more I might top up with more.
Tesco is a big beast and won't be turned around overnight. That aside, its management know what they have to do and I expect them to deliver over the next 18 months.
Only time will tell.

RNS Blackrock < 5%.

I've a largish lump of these - currently under water.

I did sell some recently and bought SSE near its 12 month low, but will hold the remainder.

Every little helps!

Tesco crowned cheapest supermarket for Christmas

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain's main equity index fell on Tuesday, with major supermarket groups hit by fresh signs of a loss of market share, while uncertainty over future U.S. monetary policy also weighed on the stock market.

Supermarket retailers joined the FTSE's loserboard after a survey by market researcher Kantar Worldpanel showed over half of Britain's households had shopped at German discount grocers Aldi or Lidl in the past 12 weeks.

The data showed that the UK's "big four" supermarkets - Tesco , Sainsbury , Wal-Mart's Asda and WM Morrison - had continued to lose market share.

Shares in Sainsbury fell 4.3 percent to the bottom of the FTSE 100 index while WM Morrison dropped 2.9 percent and Tesco weakened by around 2 percent.

"The top supermarket firms are losing market share at the bottom end to Aldi and Lidl, and losing out at the top end to Waitrose," said Hartmann Capital trader Basil Petrides.

Clarkes head is going to roll. :-)) Jack Cohen's business motto was "pile it high and sell it cheap", to which he added an internal motto of "YCDBSOYA" (You Can't Do Business Sitting On Your Arse) which he used to motivate his sales force. They have taken their eye off the ball and watched others pinch the business.

They'll probably roll out new fake price roll backs! Ever wonder why these supermarkets NEVER announce price rises!

Yes, But was that when they were private?

You must not lose market share. Tesco have got a army surrounding them in all directions. Asda seems to want a price war, Sainsbury quietly nibbling away and the likes of Aldi.

But surely all the supermarkets have lost market share over the recession as people seek out better value at the pound stores and the cheaper supermarkets? When the 'feelgood factor' starts to kick in and people feel that their income will support a move upmarket, the main supermarkets should see a resurgence in footfall and probably start to claw back the lost revenue.
Slightly worryingly, last week's IC had an article which suggested that most of Tesco's woes came from their ventures abroad which had failed (China, U.S. etc). Seems that the UK is contributing substantially to the poor performance.