The fashion giant raised its full-year profit guidance for the new financial year, despite a 53% drop in pre-tax profits to £342m in the year just completed.

While store sales tumbled 48% to £954.5m last year, Next said that online sales grew 10% to £2.37bn.

In the first eight weeks of this financial year, Next added that online sales have been “stronger than expected” – up more than 60% compared with two years ago.