Morrisons' profits take £100m fall

Morrisons’ end of year results shows just how much the Bradford-based supermarket chain has suffered throughout the ongoing price war between the UK’s ‘big four’ supermarkets.

After Morrisons announced the closure of 11 stores across the country, putting 680 jobs at risk, the supermarket has posted an underlying pre-tax profit of £242m for the year ending 31 January, down over £100m from the previous year.

Morrisons’ underlying pre-tax profit was £345m at the same period a year ago.

However, the supermarket chain did report a rise in like-for-like sales, with declines of only 2% compared with a dip of 5.9% in 2014.

These results also come after Morrisons beat expectations and reported a slight sales increase over the Christmas Period. In the nine weeks ending on January 3rd, the supermarket chain saw like-for-like sales rise by 0.2%.

The whole of the supermarket sector is trying to stay competitive against the highly successful German discounters, Aldi and Lidl.

Late last month, Morrisons struck a new deal that will see it supply fresh and frozen food products to Amazon customers in the UK. The supermarket chain will supply products for the Amazon Prime Now and Amazon Pantry services.

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