Travis Perkins rocked as new boss Pete Redfern steps down after just six months due to ill health

Travis Perkins has been left reeling after new boss Pete Redfern was forced to step down due to ill health, after just six months in the job.

Shares in the builders’ merchant fell by 8 per cent yesterday as investors digested the news that the company would have to start hunting for a new boss again.

The Times

Travis Perkins has been left reeling after new boss Pete Redfern was forced to step down due to ill health, after just six months in the job[/caption]

The fear is that it will take some time to recruit a replacement for Mr Redfern. Investors will have to wait even longer for the new boss to get their feet under the table and come up with a plan for the business.

Mr Redfern, 54, started as CEO last September after making his name as boss of housebuilder Taylor Wimpey over the past two decades.

Travis Perkins, which owns the Toolstation brand, is the UK’s biggest distributor of building materials. It has 550 branches and 8,400 employees.

In 2021 it spun off bathroom and kitchen business Wickes in a separate listing.

The shock news comes a week before Mr Redfern was expected to unveil details of his turnaround strategy, alongside Travis Perkins’ annual results.

In October Mr Redfern gave a candid critique of Travis Perkins’ underperformance and said the firm had “become distracted”.

He also took on the role of managing merchant business.

PA

The shock news comes a week before Mr Redfern was expected to unveil details of his turnaround strategy, alongside Travis Perkins’ annual results[/caption]

The extra workload, he said, would allow him to “shorten reporting lines and develop the new strategy”.

But five months later Mr Redfern is having to step away from work altogether, leaving big question marks about the future direction of Travis Perkins.

Chairman Geoff Drabble said ­yesterday: “The Board and I are very sorry that Pete’s brief but promising tenure as CEO has been brought to a premature conclusion for reasons beyond his and our control, and which none of us had anticipated.

“On a personal level, and on behalf of the Board, I would like to thank Pete for his valuable contribution kickstarting the group’s efforts to refocus on the customer experience and re-energise our field operations.”

Pizzas ‘junk’ debt

@Spotyphoto

Analysts at Fitch warn that Pizza Express faces pressure from rising staffing costs, challenging consumer demand, and weakening profits[/caption]

Pizza Express is junk food, according to rating agency Fitch, which yesterday issued a savage downgrade on the restaurant firm’s debt to junk territory.

Analysts at Fitch reckon the chain, famed for its American Hot and Sloppy Giuseppe pizzas, will come under pressure due to a significant increase in staffing costs due to the Budget, challenging consumer demand and weakening profits.

It has lowered the debt rating from B- to junk territory CCC+.

Private equity firm Bain Capital was this weekend reported to be injecting £30million to help shore up its finances.

But Fitch warned of “refinancing risks” and it could be classed as a “distressed” situation.

Fitch said in a note: “We believe that in the absence of material earnings improvement or imminent shareholder support..the company may have challenges with debt refinancing and its capital structure could become unsustainable”.

Pizza Express has 350 restaurants across the UK and Ireland and it has a number of sites abroad, from Cyprus to the UAE.

Tesla in double whammy

Getty

Tesla’s shares dropped sharply yesterday as the electric car company faced a double blow from concerns over the US economy and a slowdown in its own sales[/caption]

Shares in Elon Musk’s Tesla plunged yesterday as the electric car firm was hit by a double whammy of fears about the US economy and its own sales slowdown.

Wall Street tumbled yesterday after President Trump refused to rule out recession risks and said his introduction of tariffs meant a “period of transition” for the US economy.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Index dropped by 3 per cent yesterday while the S&P 500 sank by 2 per cent as investors fear the US economy may be dented in the short term.

The so-called “Magnificent Seven”, which consists of Tesla, NVIDIA, Google owner Alphabet, Apple, Amazon, Meta and Microsoft, all suffered sliding shares.

Shares in Tesla dropped another 11 per cent yesterday as analysts at UBS also cut their forecasts for the number of cars Tesla will deliver this year to 1.7 million, below Wall Street’s consensus of 2 million.

20% dive on ships

Clarkson, the world’s biggest shipbroking firm, saw its shares tank by over a fifth yesterday after warning global conflicts, trade tensions and tariffs were affecting business.

Clarkson, which was accused of profiteering during the pandemic, said that rates were sharply falling due to global uncertainty.

Threats in the Red Sea from Houthi rebels meant traffic through the Suez Canal was at historic low levels.

It’s Assura deal

Assura, the FTSE 250 landlord to hundreds of doctors’ surgeries and healthcare centres, says it is “minded” to approve a £1.61billion private equity takeover.

The firm had rejected four previous offers from private equity giant KKR. However, the US buyout firm has come back with a 49.3p-a-share offer and partnered with another investor, Stonepeak.

Assura has over 600 UK healthcare buildings with a £2.7billion book value. Shares rose by 14 per cent yesterday, valuing the firm at £1.5billion.

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Less than a fifth of engineering and manufacturing firms are confident the Government can fix an ongoing skills shortage.

An In-Comm Training poll found 61 per cent of HR leads do not understand what Labour’s new body Skills England is for.

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Fix a good call

Virgin Media O2 has said it will spend £2million a day to fix signal blackouts in Britain.

The telecom firm said it will focus on expanding 4G and 5G coverage to “not-spots” in rural and coastal areas.

It is also focusing on how to boost capacity in dense urban areas and fix the ongoing bugbears of rubbish signals along railway lines, at airports and on motorways.

It will be deploying new networks to ensure “uninterrupted connectivity” for live events, such as football games and music gigs.