Ocado shares rise but losses widen

Ocado shares rise but losses widen

Ocado Group (LON:OCDO) saw its shares rise on Tuesday as the British online supermarket posted revenue growth in its full year results, though loss before tax widened.

Shares in Ocado were trading over 2% higher on Tuesday afternoon.

The company posted a retail revenue growth of 10.3% for the 52 weeks ended 1 December.

This result makes Ocado Retail the fastest growing grocer in the UK.

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Group EBITDA was £43.3 million, reflecting the impacts of the Andover fire which hit the business earlier last year, as well as other factors.

However, the company posted a wider loss before tax, amounting to £214.5 million and deeper than the £44.4 million figure a year prior.

Looking ahead, retail revenue growth is expected to be between the range of 10% to 15%.

“We are pleased to report results which show strong momentum in the business. Although statutory results reflected a combination of factors, including the impact of the Andover fire, the underlying performance of Ocado Retail and the successful growth of Ocado Solutions were very encouraging,” Tim Steiner, Chief Executive Officer of Ocado Group, said in a company statement.

The first half of this year will see a new milestone for Ocado Group; the opening of the first customer fulfilment centres for our international partners. These state-of-the-art robotic facilities are a core part of an end-to-end solution embracing automated fulfilment, an intuitive and easy to use webshop, and hyper-efficient last-mile delivery which will enable Sobeys and Groupe Casino to deliver the same outstanding customer experience to consumers in Canada and France as Ocado Retail does today here in the UK,” the Chief Executive Officer said. 

Tim Steiner said: “The landscape of grocery retailing globally is changing. We are excited to be able to play a leadership role through Ocado Retail, our joint venture with M&S, and through our Solutions partnerships, as we fulfil our mission of ‘changing the way the world shops’.”

Last year, Marks & Spencer (LON:MKS) and Ocado agreed on a joint food delivery venture.

Shares in Ocado Group plc (LON:OCDO) were up on Tuesday, trading at +1.11% as of 13:43 GMT.