Fast Retailing, the owner of Japanese-based fashion giant Uniqlo, has issued a profit warning after unseasonably warm weather forced it to slash prices for winter clothes.
For the full year through August, Fast Retail forecast an operating profit of 260bn yen (£1.79bn) for Uniqlo, down 10bn yen (£69m) on its previous estimate, according to Reuters.
The retailer blamed a mild winter period which led to heavy discounting in order to offload its cold-weather inventory for the downturn.
Even despite the profit warning, the 260bn yen profit figure would be a record high for the retailer and represents a 10% year-on-year rise.
Uniqlo’s sales and profits for the second quarter of the year were up, driven by the growth of its digital offer and its business arm in China. Sales and profits saw a 20% year-on-year uptick in the first half of last year to 68bn yen (£470m).
The fashion giant’s ecommerce offering grew, with domestic sales in Japan leaping 30% year-on-year.
It expanded to 633 stores in the country in the last fiscal year, a 78-net store expansion from the previous year, but locations fell by four in Japan to 827.
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