No particular surprise that retailers are struggling as consumption remains quite weak, due to the pressure of cost of living and high interest rates. So, the growth of same store sales remains limited.
The main surprise for me is the margin increase disclosed by some retailers (Baby Bunting, City Chic). I was more expecting the opposite given the weakness of AUD, while a lot of retailers import most of their products and may have some difficulties to pass USD increase into their prices. One possible explanation for this good margin trend : the limited increase for the net number of stores (or floor space) due both to the closure of existing stores and the limited number of new store openings.
The end of the year has been quite strong both for BBN and CCX : . BBN : SSS of + 4.5 % for Q2 25 (+ 2.2 % for H1 25), . CCX also indicated that " holiday trading period (week 21-26) : + 3.2 % against pcp (+9 % vs pcp for ANZ)". As both companies had also a large margin increase during H1 25, these good sales for the end of the year were not done at the expense of margins.
As usual, we know that there is no general trend, as several groups (Nick Scali, Premiere, Myer) have also issued quite cautious guidance for FY 25.
