We know the Company is struggling, because their Chairman Gerry Harvey keeps telling everybody, in between his whining about the need for a GST on imported goods bought from overseas web sites, now it appears that the Company is stalling the announcement of their latest results which is not a good sign.
Today the shares hit a new 52 week low of $2.10 as the company again failed to announce 4th quarter and 2011 financial year sales.
Earlier today data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed retail sales fell by 0.1 per cent in the month, despite economists predicting sales would rise by 0.4 per cent.
“The retail numbers were quite soft,” said Su-Lin Ong, senior economist at RBC Capital Markets. ”Department stores sales were down quite sharply in the month.”
In recent weeks Harvey Norman had a falling out with long time partner Logitech with some observers now questioning whether Harvey Norman is the place to go to buy discounted consumer electronics and IT gear.
Nick Broughall writing for Australian Reseller News pointed out in an article recently that HP’s TouchPad and webOS needs mass distribution, stating that the Harvey Norman distribution deal which sees them get the HP exclusive really isn’t enough to guarantee HP’s success.
That said, “I do remember HP stating at their TouchPad “pre-launch” that the idea was to sell the TouchPad through all the stores that HP gear is normally sold, which is many more stores than Harvey Norman can boast”.
He said ‘the question is the length of time it will take for that to happen, with stores like JB Hi-Fi, other department stores and your regular “yum cha” computer store needing to have the TouchPad on sale to get the TouchPad in front of as many consumers as possible.
Harvey Norman was originally due by market calendars to release its figures last week, based on the 2010 sales release date of July 26.
Sales for the nine months to March 31 were $4.7 billion, up 1.4% on a top line basis, but down 3.5% on a same store (like for like is the description used by Harvey Norman) basis.
