Food sales at Marks & Spencer are “flying”, but the fashion business is still “hungover” from last year’s cyberattack, according to Peel Hunt.
The retailer’s grocery market share has soared from 4.1% to 4.5% since the end of March, a rate that “even M&S must be surprised by”, according to the investment bank.
It means like-for-like food sales growth must be in the high single digits, Peel Hunt said in a note to investors today.
However, “fashion is still hungover from the cyberattack,” it said. “Manual ordering and a lack of newness mean lacklustre sales in a lacklustre market.”
M&S’s online clothing & home sales were halted entirely for seven following the cyberattack in April 2025, and not fully restored until August the same year. The impact dragged group profit before tax from £671m to £210m in the financial year to the end of March 2026.
Commenting in July 2025, M&S chairman Archie Norman said the business would “still be in a form of rebuilding in months to come”.
Peel’s Hunt’s note said the fashion ranges in the first half of its current financial year were still “guesswork given how severe the attack was on systems in the division”.
“Clearly that is not going to help progress, and newness has not been as management would prefer.”
M&S is due to announce its first-half results on 4 November. Peel Hunt has held its high-end full-year forecast for the retailer but rebalanced its forecasted half one and half two profit split.
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