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Edcon sales fall as credit purchases continue slide

Johannesburg - Edcon Holdings, South Africa’s largest clothing retailer, said first-quarter sales slowed as falling credit purchases weighed on trading.

Retail-sales declined 0.9% in the three months through June as an increase in cash transactions failed to offset an 11% slump in paying at a later date, the Johannesburg-based company said in a statement on Thursday.

South African shoppers’ reduced ability to take on credit, weak economic growth and job losses affected the business, Chief Executive Officer Jurgen Schreiber told reporters on a call, a week before he leaves the company. “The situation will last for a little bit longer and the recent situation of the rand is not helping as it will lead to price increases.”

South African consumer confidence dropped to a 14-year low in the second quarter of this year, hit by frequent power cuts and rising fuel prices that weighed on the economy. The country’s currency tumbled to the lowest level since 2001 on Wednesday, while retail sales growth slowed to 2.4% in May from 3.4% the previous month.

Edcon’s chains, including Edgars, Jet and CNA, operated 1 527 outlets at the end of the period. Cash sales, which account for 58% of the total, climbed 7.4%. Edcon’s net loss widened to R828m, compared with a year-earlier loss of R499m.

Debt burden

Bain Capital Partners LLC, based in Boston, bought Edcon for about R25bn in May 2007 to tap into rising economic growth in Africa’s second-largest economy. The deal burdened the retailer with debt, which gained 6.7% to R24.2bn in the quarter.

In June, Edcon asked holders of the company’s €425m of 2019 bonds to take a loss as the company seeks to stabilise its balance sheet. Almost all of the bondholders last week accepted the exchange offer, cutting Edcon’s net cash interest payment obligations by about R1bn. Edcon is not in talks with other bondholders for further restructuring, Schreiber said.

The bond exchange “has substantially improved our cash flow”, he said. “The focus now is operations, it’s not on working on further bond changes.”

Edcon wants to enable shoppers to buy more clothes on credit to boost sales, Schreiber said. Loan approvals have halved since Edcon sold its private-label store cards business to Barclays Africa Group in 2012. Edcon has started talks will an alternative provider to its customers, Schreiber said, without giving further details.

Bernard Brookes, who was CEO of Victoria, Australia-based Myer Holdings until May, will replace Schreiber at the end of September.

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