Sports direct profit slumps by 51 per cent

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by Mark Sutton
Thursday, July 10th 2008 at 3:24PM

Decline in consumer spending blamed

Sports Direct has blamed the decline in disposable income on a 51.1 per cent slump in profits. Profit before tax fell to £85.4m for the 52 weeks ended 27 April 2008 from £174.5m the year before. Sales for the period fell 6.5 per cent to £1.26bn.

According to the Retail Bulletin, Dave Forsey, Chief Executive said: "The trading environment in Sports Direct's first year as a listed company has been the hardest we have faced in our history, inevitably impacting our results. This is, of course, disappointing, however, despite these challenges we delivered slightly ahead of our recent expectations, remaining very profitable and cash generative."

He added: "We remain focused on overcoming the current challenges while continuing to grow our business. We made strong progress on this during the year driving our international interests through the acquisition of Everlast and agreements with Retail Corp and ITAT."