The seemingly remorseless march of Inditex, already the world’s largest fashion retailer, towards further global expansion has delivered another increase in first-half sales.
The owner of Zara and Massimo Duti said that net sales from its more than 7,000 stores had risen by 11.5% to €11.7bn to July 31. It said that its like-for-like sales were up by 6% and were positive in every market it operated in.
However, despite the surge, a strong euro meant that Inditex, which makes most of its clothes in Europe, had a slightly lower-than-expected gross margin in the second quarter and analysts said that its first-half net profit of €1.37bn was a small miss on forecasts.
