Shore Capital places 'hold' rating on Marks Electrical after results

(Sharecast News) - Shore Capital put a 'hold' rating on Marks Electrical on Thursday, with the stock having previously been 'under review', after the online electrical retailer's first-half results. The broker said it's been a tough first half, with a combination of falling revenue and rising costs leading to the business becoming loss-making for the period.

"While part of this decline has been driven by weakness in the wider electronics market, the business has also suffered from having the 'wrong stock', and this has led to market share decline," it noted.

"Despite this weakness, there are still some positives here, Marks has seen a return to revenue and profit growth in the first c.6 weeks of H2."

Shore said that with a new interim CFO in place, a cost review underway and the right stock leading into Christmas, the business is well placed to deliver FY26 profit in line with consensus.

"While we believe that Marks can deliver a recovery in sales and profit, we remain cautious in the short term and thus we put out a hold recommendation with a fair value of 50p."