LONDON (ShareCast) - (Sharecast News) - Shares in Sosandar rallied on Tuesday, after the womenswear brand reiterated guidance following a solid first half, despite a major cyberattack at stockist Marks & Spencer.
The firm, which is pivoting from being online-only to include partnerships and its own bricks and mortar stores, posted a 15% jump in revenues in the six months to 30 September, to £18.7m.

Pre-tax losses widened to £1.1m from £0.7m, reflecting both the traditional weighting of profitability in the second half as well as the impact of the M&S cyber incident.

The high street giant was hit hard by a major cyberattack which left consumers unable to shop online for months. Instore sales were also affected.

Sosandar said that for five of the six months, it had received no material revenue from M&S.

However, its own website had performed well during the period, "marking a clear return to growth", with sales up 28%.

The gross margin was also unchanged at 62.2%.

Looking to the rest of the year, Sosandar said autumn trading had so far been "strong", with ongoing growth at Sosandar.com - its biggest source of sales - and a resumption of revenue through M&S.

As a result, it reiterated full-year expectations for both revenues and pre-tax profits of £43.6m and £400,000 respectively.

As at 1030 GMT, the stock had put on 7% at 7.06p.

Sosandar now has six standalone branded retail stores, representing 5% of total net revenue. As well as M&S, it also has partnership agreements with Next and John Lewis Partnership, among others.

"Looking forward, the foundations have been laid for sustainable, profitable, cash generative growth," Sosandar said.

Email this article to a friend

or share it with one of these popular networks:

• DIGG
• FACEBOOK
• STUMBLEUPON
• MIXX
• YAHOO BUZZ
• DELICIOUS
• REDDIT
• NEWSVINE