JD Sports LFL sales up 5% YTD, HomeServe trades in line with expectations

Stocks to watch

Sportswear retailer JD Sports said on Friday that like-for-like sales were up 5% year-to-date, leading the group to reiterate guidance for full-year headline pre-tax profits in line with its record performance in the year ended 29 January.

JD Sports also expects that the phasing of profits in the current trading year will reflect "a more normalised trading pattern", with approximately 35-40% of profits generated in the first half.

Home repairs and improvements business HomeServe said on Friday that trading had been in line with expectations as shareholders prepared to approve a £4.0bn takeover by Canada's Brookfield Asset Management.

The FTSE 250-listed company said its membership businesses in North America and EMEA continued to make good progress, with policy retention rates remaining strong and customer service levels remaining high. It added that it still expected the deal to close in the fourth quarter.

Newspaper round-up

Starling Bank has reported its first annual profit thanks to a surge in lending, though executives played down the impact that a controversial boom in Covid loans had on its path to profit. The chief executive and founder, Anne Boden, said the latest set of earnings were a "landmark" for the eight-year-old digital bank. Starling, which is backed by investors including Goldman Sachs and Austrian billionaire Harald McPike, swung to an inaugural annual profit of £32.0m for the year to March, from a loss of nearly £14.0m over the previous 12 months. - Guardian

Airlines have been warned that they could face fines if they do not tackle "harmful practices" fuelling chaos at UK airports, including selling more tickets than they can supply and not warning passengers about the risk of cancellations. In an open letter, the aviation and competition watchdogs told carriers they could be penalised if they are shown to be contributing to the misery of passengers hit by this summer's widespread airport disruption. – Guardian

The embattled director of the Serious Fraud Office has vowed to fight on after an official review laid bare "disastrous" mistakes in a major bribery investigation, and the third man jailed in the case had his conviction quashed. Lisa Osofsky, who was appointed in 2018, admitted that the findings of former High Court judge Sir David Calvert-Smith made a "sobering read" but that she intends to stay put and implement his recommendations. – Telegraph

Indian conglomerate Tata Group has threatened to shut Port Talbot steelworks unless it is given a £1.5bn government lifeline to help reduce carbon emissions. The company's Tata Steel UK business, which owns the plant in South Wales, has been in talks with the Government about decarbonisation plans over the past two years, but those have now stalled. As one of Britain's largest industrial groups, Tata Steel UK is a huge emitter of carbon dioxide. – Telegraph

EDF is seeking to amend the controversial subsidy contract for its £26.0bn Hinkley Point C nuclear plant so that it will not be penalised even if the plant does not start to generate power by 2030. Hinkley was supposed to start up in 2025 but EDF has pushed this back to mid-2027, primarily blaming Covid disruption, and warned of the risk of a further 15-month delay. – The Times

US close

Wall Street stocks closed higher on Thursday as market participants continued to thumb over earnings from some of the nation's biggest companies.

At the close, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 0.51% at 32,036.90, while the S&P 500 was 0.99% firmer at 3,998.95 and the Nasdaq Composite saw out the session 1.36% stronger at 12,059.61.

Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com