Tesco is due to report half-year figures this week on 7 October 2015 and investors will be keen to see how well the company is putting a disastrous 2014 behind it. Last August the group admitted it had overstated profits by £250m. This was followed by a 92 per cent slash to the full-year dividend after a whopping £7bn impairment charge hammered last year's bottom line. Since then, new chief executive Dave Lewis is attempting to turn things around by way of disposals, store closures and cost cutting.
Comparing numbers is, therefore, going to prove challenging given the radical facelift Mr Lewis has already given the group, including the sale of its Korean Homeplus business for more than £4bn. Darren Shirley, analyst at Shore Capital, expects pre-tax profit of £323m for the current financial year, which would equate to EPS of 2.9p, compared with £861m and 8.1p in the year ended February 2015.
