Troubled convenience chain My Local has closed almost 90 stores in the past few days and let more than 1,200 workers go as it faces administration, according to The Guardian. Closures include branches of the former Morrisons chain in Twickenham, Rochdale, Torquay, Maidstone and Cheltenham, where staff are said to have been laid off without redundancy pay, the paper writes. The remaining 35 stores are understood to have been sold, with the mutual Co-op said to be among the buyers.
The Ocado interims were also in the spotlight with The Financial Times noting the online retailer brushed off the launch of Amazon Fresh and insisted Brexit would not derail its long-delayed plan to sign up foreign retail partners. The Telegraph adds that Ocado CEO Tim Steiner claimed Brexit could actually boost its chances of securing an international tie-up. Whereas The Guardian focuses Ocado worries that Brexit could send supermarket prices surging as the plunging pound pushes up costs for retailers. The Times writes that the supermarket price war took a bite out of Ocado profits, with only a modest rise in first-half profits to £8.5m.
Brexit continues to make up column inches with The Independent reporting that grocery prices could soar as a result of the slump in value of the pound. British retail sales slowed in the run-up to the EU referendum, a CBI survey has shown (The Guardian). Business secretary Sajid Javid said that maintaining access to the single market is his top priority in negotiations with the EU over Britain’s exit from the bloc (The Telegraph). The Mail writes that half of Britons will save more and one in three will cut spending on holidays and big ticket items amid fears Brexit will hit their finances.
Beer company Molson Coors braved the post-Brexit volatility, selling $5.3bn of bonds on Tuesday in the first investment grade bond deal in the US since the UK voted to leave the EU, The FT says.
The UK grocery market has fallen into decline for the first time this year as the performance of all four major supermarkets worsened, The Guardian writes as it reports the latest Kantar Worldpanel data. But The Independent focuses on rival Nielsen data which shows Euro 2016 boosted supermarket sales as football fans stocked up on booze – the first sales increase in supermarkets in over a year.
The FT writes that new claims have emerged over BHS sale motives as a consultancy involved in an unsuccessful 2014 bid for BHS was told that Sir Philip Green believed he would be absolved of responsibility for any future demise. Sir Philip Green has been in secret negotiations this week with the Pensions Regulator about plugging BHS’s £571m pension shortfall, Frank Field, chair of the Work and Pensions select committee has revealed (The Telegraph). Sir Philip Green could be forced to pay as much as £400m to fill the BHS pension black hole, a City grandee has claimed (The Mail).
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