UK’s Sainsbury’s sees full-year profit at upper half of guidance

British supermarket group Sainsbury’s forecast full-year profit at the upper half of previous guidance as it reported slightly better-than-expected flat profit for the first half due to demand for its food ranges.

The group, which has a 15 per cent share of Britain’s grocery market, trailing only Tesco (TSCO.L), said it now expected a 2023/24 underlying pretax profit of between 670 million pounds and 700 million pounds ($816-$852 million).

That compares with previous guidance of 640-700 million pounds and the 690 million pounds made in 2022/23.

Sainsbury’s (SBRY.L) said it also expected to generate retail free cash flow of at least 600 million pounds – higher than its previous guidance of at least 500 million pounds.

“Strong trading momentum has continued in recent weeks and we are confident heading into the peak trading period,” it said.

For the 28 weeks to Sept. 16 underlying pretax profit was 340 million pounds, the same as in the same period last year and ahead of analysts’ average forecast of 335 million pounds.

Sainsbury’s’ second quarter like-for-like sales, excluding fuel, rose 6.6 per cent, having been up 9.8 per cent in the first quarter.

($1 = 0.8214 pounds)