Boohoo Group issued an unusually timed series of announcements on Wednesday evening, although given its spat with Frasers Group, it’s clearly in an unusual situation at the moment and therefore nothing is that surprising.

The company reported on its funding, urged shareholders to vote against the various Frasers Group proposals for the business (Frasers is its biggest single shareholder with a 27% stake), and also shared its results for the six months to the end of August. So let’s look at the latter first.

It said gross merchandise value (GMV) before returns fell 7.3% to just under £1.177 billion. Post-returns the figure was down 6.2% at £807.8 million. Meanwhile revenue dropped 15% to £619.8 million and gross profit was down 19.2% at £314.4 million. The gross margin fell to 50.7% from 53.4% and adjusted EBITDA was down to £20.8 million from £31.3 million, or 3.4% of revenue compared to 4.3% a year earlier. The adjusted loss before tax was £27.4 million, wider than the £9.1 million loss of a year earlier.

On the plus side, Debenhams GMV pre-returns rose 31.2% to £265.5 million. Debenhams is made up of the online department store including Marketplace, Beauty and (reported separately) sales of its Labels (that is, Nasty Gal, MissPap, Coast, Oasis, Warehouse, Burton Menswear, Dorothy Perkins, Wallis and Debenhams own-brand). 

Debenhams Marketplace and Beauty saw significant growth of 170% in the half and the Debenhams marketplace now has around 10,000 brands, already achieving its target set for 2024. The expansion of the beauty offering in the year “puts us in a solid position ahead of the Black Friday and Christmas trading period”.

And Boohoo’s digital-first womenswear retailer Karen Millen saw GMV pre returns up 2.3% to £78.3 million.

But less impressive, its Youth Brands (boohoo, boohooMAN and PrettyLittleThing) saw a GMV pre-returns fall of 15.9% to £833.1 million, “reflecting difficult market conditions, impacted by [the] weak consumer environment”.

And GMV pre-returns also declined in the aforementioned Labels operation, dropping by 36.5% to £86.5 million. But it’s seen improvement in the trend here throughout the year “as we manage them profitability and pivot them to our marketplace model”. 

In the second half of FY25, the group expects a higher GMV and a stronger adjusted EBITDA performance, when compared to H1 25, despite further investment into the brands to unlock shareholder value. And it’s predicting strong continued Marketplace growth.

Looking at the other news it shared, on fundraising, it announced a proposed fundraise of over £39 million, including selling shares to certain institutional investors in the US and a separate retail offer. The shares will be sold for 31p each, a small premium to the closing price on 12 November.

Finally, as mentioned, the company urged shareholders to reject the Frasers proposals.

It said this is because Boohoo is in the early stages of its business review and has a credible plan to unlock value. It also said Frasers and Mike Ashley have been acting “for the good of themselves alone”. It added that Mike Ashley, given his majority ownership of Frasers “is conflicted and not a suitable appointment to the board”.

And it believes Boohoo’s new CEO Dan Finley is “strong and dynamic [and] one of the outstanding leaders in a new generation of digital retailers”.