Boohoo upbeat on strong summer trading

14th Jul 2026 09:43

(Sharecast News) - Boohoo Group flagged strong summer trading on Tuesday, boosted in part by the hot weather, as the online retailer's turnaround continued to gather pace.

Updating shareholders at the annual general meeting, the owner of Boohoo, Debenhams, Karen Millen, MAN and PrettyLittleThing confirmed trading had been "positive" in June and July.

Chief executive Dan Finley said: "General merchandise value continues to grow year-on-year, margins are up and returns are down. Our platform model and diversified product assortment enables us to pivot quickly, and capitalise on consumer demand. This has been especially so on Debenhams during the recent hot weather."

AIM-listed Boohoo - which intends to change its name to Debenhams Group once it garners enough shareholder support - was hit hard by a surge in competition, falling sales and mounting costs. It also fought off various attempts by leading investor Frasers Group to take control of the business. The Mike Ashley-controlled business remains opposed to the proposed name change.

However, under Finley the company has sought to turn itself around, including moving to an asset-light marketplace model, consolidating warehouses and tackling high return rates. Last month, it confirmed that while revenues in the year to February end had fallen, both the margin and adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation had strengthened notably.

Finley told investors on Tuesday: "Over the course of this year, investors should expect to see much better conversion of adjusted EBITDA to reported EBITDA, and to operating profit, as the major costs of the transformation have now passed. This will be a particular feature of our first half numbers."

He also reaffirmed expectations that net debt would be "materially lower" this year.

Katie Cousins, equity research analyst at Shore Capital, said: "The improvement in the balance sheet remains a key focus for us, and so it is encouraging to see management committed to reducing net debt to adjusted EBITDA to less than 1x in the 2027 full year. Additionally, through further licensing deals and exploring disposal options, [the firm] sees scope to eliminate debt, which would be a meaningful milestone in our view.

"Overall, we view this morning's update as supportive of our recently upgraded 'buy' recommendation, as well as underpinning our forecasts."

As at 0945 BST, the stock was up 2% at 24.5p.

Boohoo is due to update on interim trading in September.

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