Sometimes change is good. The market had plenty of nerves when it received news that Asos (ASC) founder and long-time chief executive Nick Robertson would step aside and make room for a new boss. His successor Nick Beighton is proving the doubters wrong. The Aim-listed online retailer reported a resilient set of half-year results, which flew in the face of concerns over squeezed margins and profit protection.
Crucially, despite ongoing discounting, keeping a big section of its clothing at full prices helped Asos to grow retail gross margins - this time by 40 basis points to 47.2 per cent. This, along with a 21 per cent improvement in group revenues, helped the company beat profit forecasts for the first half of the financial year. Better services such as the inclusion of free returns for all European Union-based customers, have attracted more shoppers to the site, with the number of active customers up 17 per cent to 10.9m compared with this time last year.