The main risk regarding their dividend : they have a high pay...

The main risk regarding their dividend : they have a high pay out (cf post above), so they need to stabilize their earnings to keep their dividend at the same level.

Good to see that they stabilized their dividend during H1 24, when their earnings have probably bottomed (yoy), like other retailers which have given updates recently for their H2.
In a tough period (like H1 24), they were able to limit the decrease of their earnings, thanks to a good control of their gross margin and costs.
For H2, my forecast is that they improved their sales* (vs H1 24 trend), as they benefit from a lower basis of comparison for consumption for May-June period.

The other element about SSG is its high seasonality.
In FY 23, the company did 81 % of its NPAT.
So there is a limited risk for their full year earnings, once we knew that the decrease of their H1 NPAT was limited (- 9 % yoy).
The company is almost able to stabilise their full year dividend (at 10.2 c) based on their H1 EPS of 9.7 c.(reminder : they are net cash, so their payout can be above 100 %).

* like other retailers, they mentioned a sales improvement at the start of H2 (+ 0.9 % for 1 Jan 24 to 22 Feb 24 and - 0.7 % for lfl sales) while gross margin remained in line vs comparable period the year before.