Published: January 8, 2026 at 4:30 pm
Tesco shares have fallen by nearly 7% today despite the UK’s largest supermarket reporting a strong Christmas performance and nudging full-year profit guidance to the top end of its forecast range.
In a trading update covering the 19 weeks to 3rd January 2026, the retail giant reported group like-for-like sales growth of 2.9%, with UK and Republic of Ireland sales up 3.8%.
UK like-for-like sales rose 3.7%, supported by continued market share gains, while Ireland delivered stronger growth of 4.6%.
Performance was more mixed elsewhere, with Booker sales down 1.3% over the period and falling 2.1% during the six-week Christmas trading window.
Aarin Chiekrie, equity analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said the Booker performance “wasn’t as good as hoped” and argued that the “net effect” was Tesco “only nudged” guidance to the top end of the range, when “many had been hoping for a bigger upgrade”.