Super Retail (ASX: SUL) has announced a trading update and is also going to do a capital raising. Is it time to buy shares?
What is Super Retail?
Super Retail is a retail conglomerate that traces its history back to the 1970s, it’s now one of the biggest in the country. It operates a number of recognisable retail brands including BCF Boating Camping Fishing, Macpac, Rebel, and Supercheap Auto. It’s headquartered in Brisbane and has over 12,000 employees in Australia, New Zealand and China.
What did Super Retail announce?
Super Retail gave a trading update for the company for May 2020. It also announced plans for a capital raising to raise around $203 million.
Super Retail trading update
Super Retail saw a 26.2% decline in group like for like (LFL) sales in April 2020 compared to April 2019. Trading in May rebounded with sales increasing by 26.5% compared to the prior corresponding period. Group sales growth has continued to benefit from the strong consumer environment in June.
The best period to look at to see how COVID-19 has affected Super Retail is weeks 39 to 47 of the company’s financial year. Those weeks cover 22 March 2020 to 23 May 2020. Comparing sales in that period to the same period in 2019 shows total sales were down 1.7%.
Looking at the individual segments for that same week 39 to 47 period, Supercheap Auto sales were up 3.7%, Rebel sales were down 2.3%, BCF sales were down 0.7% and Macpac sales were down 38.8%.
The gross margin was down in April and May, impacted by a shift to lower margin products and more online sales. Cost mitigation measures have been put in place to help.
Super Retail capital raising
The retail company has announced that it’s going to do an underwritten accelerated pro-rata non-renounceable capital raising to raise $203 million at $7.19 per share. This price is a 7% discount to the ‘theoretical ex rights price’ and the new shares issued will represent 14.3% of the existing shares. Retail shareholders will be able to start applying from 22 June 2020.
Management said the money will enable the company to keep executing its plan: grow the four core brands, leverage closeness to the consumer, have a connected omni-retail supply chain, simplify the business and have a COVID-19 efficient business.
Time to buy Super Retail shares?
The capital raising price is a decent discount, but you could have gotten a better price through most of March, the whole of April and half of May. If I were a shareholder I’d weigh up whether I wanted to buy more shares or not.
There are other retail-related shares that could make better long-term buys such as Kogan (ASX: KGN) or BWX Ltd (ASX: BWX).
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Disclosure: At the time of writing, Jaz doesn’t own shares in any of the businesses mentioned.
