Halfords, the UK's leading retailer of motoring, cycling and leisure products, has released its half year results:

Revenue up 13.9% and like-for-like sales grew by 8.3%.

Underlying profit before tax up 15.8%.

Profit before tax for the full year guided at £48-53 million, towards the low end of the previous range (£48-58m).

Charlie Huggins, Manager of the Quality Shares Portfolio at Wealth Club, commented:

"Halfords has seen a good start to the year with strong sales and profit growth, and increased market share across the piste. However, the trading environment remains challenging, and appears to have worsened in the last couple of months. This leaves the outlook for the second half more murky.

The slower than expected growth in more discretionary higher-priced categories, like cycling suggests consumers are feeling the pinch. This is not a great surprise given the rapid increase in interest rates and on-going cost of living pressures. Halfords has responded by focusing on what it can control, including cutting prices and costs. This has been a smart move, leading to market share gains, without sacrificing operating margins.

Overall, it's hard to grumble with Halford's performance given a very tricky consumer backdrop. But the deterioration of trading in the last couple of months is a concern. Looking ahead to 2024, the consumer is likely to remain under pressure meaning Halfords will need to work even harder to avoid stalling."

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For further information contact:

Jo Thorne: 07939882816, jo.thorne@wealthclub.co.uk

Wealth Club

The aim of Wealth Club is simple. To provide high net worth individuals and sophisticated investors with clear, impartial and well researched information on investment opportunities not typically available through mainstream stockbrokers or financial advisers. Wealth Club was set up in February 2016 and is now the largest non-advisory broker of tax efficient investments such as VCTs, EIS and Inheritance Tax Portfolios. Since launch 11,000 clients have invested more than £1.1 billion through its platform.

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