Saga shares crash as boss rips up strategy and slashes the dividend. Over-50s specialist Saga (SAGA) shocked the City on Thursday after a drastic overhaul of its misfiring car and home insurance sales triggered a colossal profit warning. The cruises-to-insurance supplier, which has one million members, saw its shares plummet 34% to a historic low of 70.05p after admitting its strategy for selling insurance was wrong and it had been too focused on chasing short-term profits. The company unveiled a drastic plan to shrink the size of the insurance division considerably, leading to a £310 million writedown. Operating profits will fall by more than a third next year to between £105 million and £120 million. The final dividend is also being cut from 6p to 1p.
Intu’s incoming boss Matthew Roberts says shopping centres owner can thrive alone. Matthew Roberts, who was on Thursday named as Intu Properties (INTU) incoming boss, said he is “confident” the shopping centres owner can go it alone after a year of takeover trauma. Intu’s current finance chief Roberts will succeed long-standing boss David Fischel with effect from April 29. FTSE 250 landlord Intu, which is behind centres in the UK and Spain, including Lakeside, said 55-year-old Roberts was appointed after “a rigorous search process”. He takes the helm after a tough 2018 for the business that saw larger rival Hammerson ditch a £3.4 billion takeover offer and a consortium led by Brookfield and Intu’s deputy chairman John Whittaker walk away from talks. Those proposals were respectively at 253.9p and 215p per share.
Mothercare ‘out of surgical ward’ as it eyes sale of UK arm. Mothercare (MTC) could offload the troubled UK arm of the retailer, its boss admitted on Wednesday, after another drop in sales at home. Chief executive Mark Newton-Jones, who is spearheading a turnaround, said: “If somebody were to come along and say, ‘we’d be interested to have a look at the UK,’ [and] they wouldn’t have done that a year ago, of course [we’d consider it].” Same-store sales at the toys and baby clothes seller fell 8.8% in Britain in the quarter to March 30 as it accelerated its planned store closures, but the sales decline eased off slightly. Newton-Jones plans to grow the international arm, which is profitable and in 48 countries, and wants to make the UK business “cash generative” within a year, making it more attractive for potential suitors.
