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Tesco Net Profit Analysis

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3.2.2 Net profit margin comparison
Net profit margin is a commonly used profitability measurement tool which assesses firm’s net profit by comparing to its sales revenue. It is quite an appropriate measure of a firm’s profitability position because it considers the net income after tax rather the gross income (Bryman, 2008). Net profit margin of both J Sainsbury Plc and its comparable firm Tesco Plc is given in the following table:
Table 1: Net profit margin of J Sainsbury Plc. & Tesco Plc. from 2013 to 2015
Net profit margin 2013 2014 2015
Sainsbury 0.0037849 0.0421312 0.03407
Tesco 0.037567 0.0413959 -0.929934 The overall Sainsbury’s net profit margin changed a lot with a huge drop in 2015 on 0.0034069. …show more content…

However back then the ratios of the two companies were comparable but their gap turned massive as Tesco hit an extreme low in 2015 with a negative ratio of 0.092993385 where Tesco generated an operating loss twice as large as the operating profit it made in 2014. One of the main circumstances leading to this loss-making Tesco is the £263m accounting scandal that hit the supermarket last year (Neville, 2015). As a result many costs have hit Tesco’s profits turning it into a loss such as restructuring costs including redundancy and compensation costs related to changes in store colleague working arrangements in the UK, Europe and Asia, redundancy costs relating to Head Office restructures across the Group, and the redundancy cost of store closures in the UK. £266m has been recognized in costs of sales and £150m within administrative expenses. (Tesco, 2015)

J Sainsbury Plc is in a stable position and it is in better position in all the three years than the net profit margin of Tesco. This is the consequence of better implementation and introduction of higher quality products in their sales mix.
3.2.3 Return on capital employed (ROCE)

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