Shore Capital's highly rated retail analysts are still bullish on Next (LSE:NXT), repeating a Buy recommendation, after the clothing and homeware retailer posted second-quarter full-price sales growth of 9.2%.
For context, it was a more than 100% outperformance from the 4% that Next had previously guided for.
Whilst noting the current premium in the Next price, Shore Cap analysts still reckon the long-term value case holds, and pointed abroad for a potential driver - more specifically, analysts noted that Next managed 37% international sales growth during what is the quieter trading period.
Next itself raised full-year pre-tax profit guidance by £25m to £1,243m, up 7.3% year-on-year, attributing £15m to additional full-price sales and £10m to stronger equity investment performance.
Indeed, Shore Capital noted that Next has been investing "much more than previously anticipated" in marketing to profitably capture international demand, a segment it expects to keep growing toward more than 20% of group revenue.
