Stock of the day: JD Sports Fashion PLC
The sports-fashion firm packed a lot into 2017. The first few months of the year saw the stock soar to all-time highs of £4.60, only for it to plunge back below the £3 mark at the end of August following a fairly horrendous summer for the UK retail sector.
Autumn and winter saw the stock enact a similar pattern, just on a smaller scale, rising to £3.94 in the middle of September before gradually slipping to £3.36 by the year’s end. JD Sports Fashion PLC (LON:JD) now sits at a current trading price of £3.52.
The company’s last report, its interim results in September, paints a rather different picture than its rocky market performance. For the 26 weeks to 29th July JD Sports saw a colossal 41% jump in revenue to a record £1.367 billion, coupled with a 33% surge in pre-tax profit to £102.7 million.
Like-for-like sales in UK and Ireland stores rose 3%, with a 7% jump in Europe (a slight pullback from the previous year’s 10% increase). Online sales, meanwhile, continued to grow, and comprised 13.7% of the firm’s total sales compared to an 11.1% share in 2016. During this half year period JD Sports also added 12 new stores in the UK and Ireland, alongside a net increase of 23 new openings in mainland Europe, its first store in Australia and a smattering of additions in Malaysia.
In terms of Tuesday’s trading update, then, investors will be expecting big things from JD Sports. Its stock price was plagued by fears that the athleisure trend may be waning in 2017, fears that its stellar half year figures could only go some way to alleviating. Another set of blockbuster numbers, however, may help propel it back to towards April’s all-time highs.
JD Sports Fashion PLC has a consensus rating of ‘Buy’ alongside an average target price of £5.49.
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