Morrisons slashes profit expectations
07.38 Morrisons posted its lowest profit in five years, slashed expectations going forward and announcing plans to sell off £1bn of its £9bn property portfolio.
Britain's fourth biggest grocer, which trails market leader Tesco, Wal-Mart's Asda and J Sainsbury in annual sales, said it now expected an underlying pretax profit in 2014-15 in the range of £325-£375m.
Before the update, analysts were on forecasting an underlying pretax profit of £732m.
The group also announced more investment in lower prices in response to the traction gained by the hard discounters, Aldi and Lidl and moves by its "big four" rivals.
China industrial and retail data spark slowdown fears
07.30 China's industrial output rose 8.6pc in January and February year-on-year, the worst result in nearly five years.
The figure, which measures production at factories, workshops and mines, was the lowest since 7.3 percent was recorded in April 2009, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
Retail sales, a key indicator of consumer spending in the world's second-largest economy, gained 11.8pc in the two months from the year before, also the lowest for several years.
Fixed asset investment, a measure of government spending on infrastructure, expanded 17.9pc during the first two months of 2014, the NBS added.
The figures come as China's leadership says it wants to transform the growth model away from an over-reliance on often wasteful investment, and instead make private demand the driver for the country's future development.
China announced earlier this month that is targeting economic growth of about 7.5pc in 2014.
The country's gross domestic product (GDP) grew 7.7pc in 2013, unchanged from the year before, which was the worst result since 1999.
Today's business stories
07.15 Here's what's leading our business pages this morning
• Szu Ping Chan reports that UK faces 'crippling' tax rises and spending cuts to fund pensions and healthcare
• Herbalife, the US nutritional supplements company at the centre of a long-running row between two billionaires, is facing an official investigation over claims it operates as a “pyramid scheme", reports Andrew Trotman
• Steven Swinford and Matthew Holehouse write that Conservatives should consider scrapping the 40p higher rate of income tax, Number 10 policy adviser Nadhim Zahawi says
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