Marks & Spencer (M&S) reported full-year profits at the top end of market forecasts today despite cooling consumer confidence and an unexpected dip in fourth quarter clothing sales.
Britain's biggest clothing retailer said pre-tax profits for the year ending March were £721.3 million (€1 billion) for the year to end-March, up 11.5 per cent from the previous year.
M&S has hauled itself out of a three-year sales slump by switching to cheaper foreign suppliers as well as introducing new designers and brands such as the "per una" young fashion range.
But chief executive Mr Roger Holmes told BBC radio today he expected sluggish growth in the retail market amid waning consumer confidence.
British retail sales growth slowed sharply in the fourth quarter to 2.4 per cent. Market watchers fear tax rises, a cooling house market and job insecurity may make it harder to lure consumers into stores.
But the firm said in April factors such as a late Easter and the looming war with Iraq meant it was hard to draw any meaningful conclusions from trade in that period.