Speaker 1: It's about twelve thirty on a Tuesday, and I'm Leanne
Speaker 1: Garin's a reporter and a producer for Bloomberg and I
Speaker 1: just had to nip out of the office to do
Speaker 1: some errands this afternoon. And as I left that in
Speaker 1: the city podcast team asked me to grab a mic
Speaker 1: and just get a feel for what's happening on the
Speaker 1: streets around our building again, what shops are closed and open,
Speaker 1: and what people are grabbing. I've just walked past o Waiters,
Speaker 1: one of my old clothing stores I used to come
Speaker 1: to regularly, but sadly it's now closed. There's a few
Speaker 1: people that I can see just shopping in argus. They're
Speaker 1: probably getting some more essentials. I need to pick up
Speaker 1: some coat hangers at some point. So I'm just outside
Speaker 1: Paper Taste, which is a shop that sells everything from
Speaker 1: cards to sparkly pens to fancy photo frames. So there's
Speaker 1: a big yellow sign saying all dark reduced, and when
Speaker 1: we peeped through the window, it says twenty percent off
Speaker 1: pretty much everything that's much. So I've just walked into
Speaker 1: Paper Chase. I'm having a look around. Oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: Peter Rabbit birthday invitations and it's off one fifty. So
Speaker 1: I'm carrying on walking down Poultry Street. I need to
Speaker 1: go and get a gym top. Actually, so I've just
Speaker 1: entered one ne change the shopping center near our office. Well,
Speaker 1: Hugo Boss is empty and then Espresso pretty much empty.
Speaker 1: I'm just in a very popular athletic shop here in
Speaker 1: the city and I was looking for a top to
Speaker 1: play my tennis match in trying to find a top
Speaker 1: in a different size, so I'm just gonna have to
Speaker 1: ask the lady. So ironically, I just had to leave
Speaker 1: Sweaty Betty because I couldn't stand in the queue any
Speaker 1: longer waiting to get another size top. And that's because
Speaker 1: it was just too busy. So maybe some stores are
Speaker 1: weathering the storm. So Dave and Francine, I hope you've
Speaker 1: enjoyed my on the ground reporting and got something out
Speaker 1: of it, because I didn't. I'm David Merritt's and I'm
Speaker 1: Francing Laquax and this is in the City, Bloomberg's podcast,
Speaker 1: connecting you to the stories and the voices at the
Speaker 1: heart of the City of London. Now this week we
Speaker 1: talk shopping and distress. It's not an easy time is
Speaker 1: it Francine on the British High Street. I mean you
Speaker 1: walk around here outside there are empty shops, they've been
Speaker 1: empty since the pandemic, but no one's taking the space.
Speaker 1: It's not just here, it's all over London. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't know how many people actually come to the City
Speaker 1: of London shop, but it is I guess, a good
Speaker 1: barometer on whether people are so come back to the office.
Speaker 1: So I wonder whether this is distressed companies, under stress retailers,
Speaker 1: or whether we shop differently selfages have got that few
Speaker 1: neon sign outside saying what does it say? We've got
Speaker 1: to reinvent how you change the way we shop? And yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of footfall down Oxtor Street, but there's
Speaker 1: still those empty stores, those big flagship buildings like Debenhom's,
Speaker 1: like House of Fraser that no one wants to take over.
Speaker 1: And it's all about the economy, with of course the
Speaker 1: cost of living crisis, higher interest rates, the Hyacinths two
Speaker 1: thousand and seven and inflation hitting a lot of consumers
Speaker 1: that maybe would have you not thought twice by buying
Speaker 1: two or three codes exactly, And it just feels like
Speaker 1: it's possibly worse here than anyone in the We know
Speaker 1: the economic headwinds are everywhere. But you know, we've had
Speaker 1: the report about the British economy bearing worse than all
Speaker 1: the G seven this year and companies are in distress.
Speaker 1: We've got a new newsletter out, so that's exciting. This
Speaker 1: is a new Bloomberg newsletter which everyone needs to subscribe to,
Speaker 1: The Brink. The Brink, and it's called that because this
Speaker 1: is what companies are facing right There's a big debt
Speaker 1: cliff that everyone's looking at and who's going to be
Speaker 1: the next me, the big high Street name to fail.
Speaker 1: That's what everyone's talking about. The brink. It kind of
Speaker 1: fills me with dread. So to unpack all of this,
Speaker 1: we're joining the podcast studio by your UK Retail reporter
Speaker 1: Katie Linzel and Juliette More Poorer Go European Credit and
Speaker 1: High Yield and Distressed Reporter, So thank you both for
Speaker 1: joining us. So, Katie, how bad is it? Well, it
Speaker 1: depends which part of retail you look at, but it's
Speaker 1: not looking very comfortable, let's put it that way. So
Speaker 1: many retailers are hoping that over the course of this
Speaker 1: year things will get better, you know, inflation will start
Speaker 1: to ease off a bit. But really we're saying it's
Speaker 1: it's pretty tough. And for example, if you look at
Speaker 1: the online only fast fashion retailers, they had some very
Speaker 1: bumpy performance over Christmas. Of course, they will also faced
Speaker 1: by postal strikes, so that made it much harder to
Speaker 1: get items out to customers a source for example, if
Speaker 1: you'd take them as an example, they are looking at
Speaker 1: a loss for the first half and promising a lot
Speaker 1: in their second half performance and they have debt coming
Speaker 1: due next year. So yeah, there are many names we
Speaker 1: can look at that it's it's a bit painful at
Speaker 1: the moment. I mean we spoke before Christmas, didn't worry
Speaker 1: about what the outlook might be, and then was a
Speaker 1: kind of in now is it across the board? Has
Speaker 1: it been a bad season for the retailers in Britain?
Speaker 1: So volumes did actually fall at Christmas, it was only
Speaker 1: a minor fall, but still that's something that a lot
Speaker 1: of people are looking at because when you look at
Speaker 1: the sales figures, a lot of retailers are coming through
Speaker 1: and saying sales are they have grown. The supermarkets in
Speaker 1: many cases of saying we had record sales and approach
Speaker 1: to Christmas. But this is inflation that's pumping up sales figures.
Speaker 1: You know, we're paying more forgetting less at the moment.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I think it is looking very tough. And
Speaker 1: Christmas was a bit better than than many observers expected.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, we've seen a lot of
Speaker 1: consumers leaning on debt. They're using buy and our pay
Speaker 1: later to make some of those purchases. It's not the
Speaker 1: most comfortable position to be in going into three And Julia,
Speaker 1: how is this translating into the health of these companies?
Speaker 1: Are we seeing heightened levels of distress when we look
Speaker 1: at the debt a lot of these companies if your
Speaker 1: demand demand from your consumers is lower and if your
Speaker 1: costs are going up. Because we have to think about
Speaker 1: retailers like apperl stores, supermarkets, they'rely in lingalso with things
Speaker 1: like higher staff costs, have higher energy bills, so you've
Speaker 1: got like a combination that leads to them generating fewer
Speaker 1: profits and fewer cash to just pay interest on their debt.
Speaker 1: And that's particularly an issue when companies have a heavy
Speaker 1: debt structure, which is what a lot of these retailers,
Speaker 1: especially in the UK have built over the last years.
Speaker 1: You know, supermarkets that are loaded up with billions and
Speaker 1: billions of that. Like, as soon as you start generating
Speaker 1: a bit less cash, it becomes a problem to keep
Speaker 1: servicing these heavy debt structures. But what are they focusing on?
Speaker 1: So is it are they just trying to preserve market
Speaker 1: share at the moment or are we finding ourselves that
Speaker 1: because of leverage in the past, an interest rates going higher,
Speaker 1: there's just retailers that are going to go bust because
Speaker 1: they can't afford it. I think the focus is on,
Speaker 1: you know, just staying afloat in terms of operations and
Speaker 1: retaining the market share they have, but also on the
Speaker 1: death side is really trying to lower that that structure
Speaker 1: if they can. A lot of them are doing as
Speaker 1: it sales for instance, it's not exactly a retailer. One
Speaker 1: company that comes to mind is a stone Gate pub
Speaker 1: Bloomer reported that they're selling over a thousand pubs. The
Speaker 1: thing that they're trying to do mostly is really trying
Speaker 1: to refinance their deb if maturities are approaching. But that's
Speaker 1: increasingly challenging and increasingly costly, and as an that investor,
Speaker 1: you want to be selective when it comes to which
Speaker 1: credit you're going to be investing in. So you look
Speaker 1: at the retail sector and think, oh, well, maybe this
Speaker 1: is not for me. I'm gonna go with something that's
Speaker 1: less consumer e supposed because we are in a high
Speaker 1: inflation recessionary environment, so a lot of them are not
Speaker 1: able to access capital markets like they used to be,
Speaker 1: and therefore the they have to seek emergency funding and
Speaker 1: that's um and if they find it, because if they
Speaker 1: don't find it, it's probably gonna head for insolvency. We've
Speaker 1: seen many of them on able to meet their maturities
Speaker 1: and having to start talks with creditors. One example is Matalanda,
Speaker 1: discount retailer. They just got taken over by funds because
Speaker 1: they were not able to refinance their bonds that were
Speaker 1: doing January, and they were not able to sell the
Speaker 1: company because no one was offering enough for it. It
Speaker 1: sounds like a pretty bleak situation. You know, people are
Speaker 1: not able to refinance this debt. You mentioned the word
Speaker 1: was actually you know, we were in a recessionary environment.
Speaker 1: You said, I mean historically a recession means disaster for
Speaker 1: the high street, right for retailers is that what many
Speaker 1: of them are experiencing. Now, o Katie's are we are
Speaker 1: we deep in recession in Britain. Well, we've seen plenty
Speaker 1: of insolvencies lately, right. I think it was this week
Speaker 1: that paper Chase came to lighten. Yes, but one is
Speaker 1: boarded up downside. Yeah, so Testco overstepped into buy paper Chase.
Speaker 1: But that means the brand, That means the I P.
Speaker 1: That does not mean the stores or the employees. And
Speaker 1: how many stores is that? Well, it's many, yeah, it's hundreds.
Speaker 1: Um and um. Also late last year we saw Jewels
Speaker 1: going too insolvency made dot Com. Both of those were
Speaker 1: bought by Next. But again this is not the case
Speaker 1: of stores being kept or loads of jobs being kept. Um.
Speaker 1: So there are some opportunities for the for the big
Speaker 1: retailers who are playing the game correctly. Next and also
Speaker 1: phrases Mike Ashley's Empire, they're doing quite a lot of buying. Um.
Speaker 1: But you know, in the UK in recent years we've
Speaker 1: seen quite a few retailers go under and I think
Speaker 1: we're in that pattern. You know, it's it's not disappeared. Um.
Speaker 1: The retailers have really struggled to survive during the pandemic
Speaker 1: and now we've got across a living It's a pretty
Speaker 1: painful double whammy. I mean, no retailer is created equal.
Speaker 1: So is it is it the bad retailers? Like is
Speaker 1: it the retails where people don't sharp that girl bust?
Speaker 1: Or could it be a healthy retailer that just can't
Speaker 1: get up front of, you know, some of the financing
Speaker 1: that they need to deal with. I think it's definitely
Speaker 1: the l fy ones and with a healthy capital structure
Speaker 1: are going to be able to weather the storm. It's
Speaker 1: more a matter of really how levered your capital structure
Speaker 1: is and what's really your appeal to consumers in this time.
Speaker 1: You know, we're seeing a lot of mid range retailers
Speaker 1: being squeezed, for instance, and those are probably, you know,
Speaker 1: if combined with a lot of that are going to
Speaker 1: be the ones that struggle the most in the grocer space,
Speaker 1: the names that everyone is looking at as then Morrisons,
Speaker 1: which are kind of in the mid range when it
Speaker 1: comes to which consumer base they target, they are losing
Speaker 1: clients to supermarkets like Aldi and Liddle because people are
Speaker 1: trying to shopper a bit cheaper and both as the
Speaker 1: Morrisons have billions that that that were loaded on them
Speaker 1: as they were the object of leverage buyouts at a
Speaker 1: time when valuations were so high. Now it looks like
Speaker 1: their value and the market share that they have is
Speaker 1: going down and they have these, you know, billions of
Speaker 1: that that they need to service. So investors are particularly
Speaker 1: concerned about those types of names in the middle. I
Speaker 1: would say, so all of those deals that were donswer
Speaker 1: leveraging up these companies that happen for you in years
Speaker 1: with very low interest rates. Obviously thanking them put up
Speaker 1: rates to four. There's possibly more to come until those
Speaker 1: have peaked. Who's feeling the pain from all of this?
Speaker 1: Which investors are really hurtic. What is going to be
Speaker 1: the fallout from h these deals not being able to
Speaker 1: be refinanced. I mean definitely, if you're a junk that
Speaker 1: investors that has piled money into these deals, you are
Speaker 1: worried about seeing the bomb prices moving down and you're
Speaker 1: worried about not being able to refinance. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: if you are a distressed investor and you're looking at
Speaker 1: these bomb prices going down and you're thinking, Okay, this
Speaker 1: company is not going to be able to um access
Speaker 1: capital markets, it might be an opportunity for them. They
Speaker 1: might step in by the that and if a solution
Speaker 1: is not found, kickoff negotiations with the company and eventually
Speaker 1: take it over for a very cheap price. So there's
Speaker 1: opportunities for invest Definitely opportunity Exactly, you need to be
Speaker 1: able to digest a lot of risk. I guess how's
Speaker 1: I mean, how's luxury doing. It's been a huge growth sector.
Speaker 1: But I mean the Chinese luy luxury want what the
Speaker 1: Chinese coming it up post? But how how is the
Speaker 1: luxury doing in writin and also across Europe? Luxury is
Speaker 1: broadly doing much better. I mean we should be looking
Speaker 1: at sort the luxury and the budget and the retail
Speaker 1: as being the sort of strong form either pole basically
Speaker 1: sort of very cheap or luxury. Yes, and so people
Speaker 1: you know, they're still buying their luxury handbags. I mean
Speaker 1: that there are we should remember there are those who
Speaker 1: aren't so touched by the cost of living crisis, right,
Speaker 1: and they can keep buying um. But yeah, generally the
Speaker 1: picture with luxury in the UK is that we want
Speaker 1: the Chinese business bag and we want the sort of
Speaker 1: v Yes, but I think that's not until a bit
Speaker 1: later in the year. I think it's a bit early
Speaker 1: to say that right now. But yeah, I was speaking
Speaker 1: to Harrod's recently, for example, and they are very much
Speaker 1: looking forward to this later in the year. So who's
Speaker 1: the squeeze middle, Like, where's John Lewis? John Lewis, I mean,
Speaker 1: they're in a bit of a rocky position right as
Speaker 1: a department store with still still so many stores across
Speaker 1: the UK. Um, And I mean they didn't didn't actually
Speaker 1: have to report on their Christmas performance, so we'll wait
Speaker 1: and see. Um. John Lewis do sort of lean heavily
Speaker 1: on the fact that they there's this word that comes
Speaker 1: up in retail which I don't really love, but omni channel.
Speaker 1: So this idea that the retailer can reach you at
Speaker 1: home in store. Um. Of course they have a tie
Speaker 1: up with wait Rose for their deliveries and returns and things.
Speaker 1: So um, see John Lewis, I think the jury is out.
Speaker 1: We will see how that goes. Can I do a poll?
Speaker 1: When's the last time you were in store? Dave? You
Speaker 1: know what? I went into John Lewis the other day,
Speaker 1: but actually only to return a broken product that when's
Speaker 1: the last time you were in store? Kidding to purchase
Speaker 1: or just browsing? Um, I don't even know. I bought
Speaker 1: online the other week, does that this week? Probably everything
Speaker 1: on Amazon were last time I think like two three
Speaker 1: weeks ago. Okay, so you're like the outlier. But you
Speaker 1: know we're changing. We just don't go to stores really anymore.
Speaker 1: And this is the time of year as well, you
Speaker 1: know January February or the post Christmas gloom. You know,
Speaker 1: why why would we be the stores as much as
Speaker 1: we did during that that run up to Christmas? So
Speaker 1: it's it's a tough time. I think Dave went to
Speaker 1: talks for a Street and was shocked. He's never doing
Speaker 1: Christmas too many people feel a lot of people but no,
Speaker 1: you know, but well they're actually buying anything, the question.
Speaker 1: People are swarming to these areas, but I don't know
Speaker 1: they're actually transacting anything. Yeah, I mean retail is still
Speaker 1: a very popular sort of leisure activity. Right, So we've
Speaker 1: since the pandemic, we've seen online come back. As as
Speaker 1: we were discussing, you know, it hasn't been the boom
Speaker 1: that people were hoping. So there is more footfall to stores,
Speaker 1: but how much purchasing is happening is as yet to
Speaker 1: be seen. Do you know how we stacking up in
Speaker 1: Britain versus the rest of the world. I mean, we've
Speaker 1: heard about the r F say Britain is going to
Speaker 1: be the only G seven country that's going to contract
Speaker 1: this year. Are we to we you know, we love
Speaker 1: talking ourselves down in Britain. We are we worse in
Speaker 1: terms of the debt situation, in terms of the forecast
Speaker 1: for these retailers than there for us. Well, I have
Speaker 1: to say that it's not lookingly exactly good, especially when
Speaker 1: compared to the rest of Europe. The British high street
Speaker 1: is extremely extremely leveraged because it's a bigger sector and
Speaker 1: it's been the subject of a lot more leveraged buy
Speaker 1: out private equity firms. I've been targeting British retailers um
Speaker 1: for a long time and it's just not been the
Speaker 1: same level of transactions when it comes to the other
Speaker 1: European markets. But that means that they're more leverage and
Speaker 1: therefore when you start having less generating less cash, but
Speaker 1: you have these heavier death structures, and I mean that's
Speaker 1: going to be more of an issue in the UK
Speaker 1: than annyone see Europe. The other thing is that inflation
Speaker 1: as obviously hit the UK the artist especially vers years
Speaker 1: on for instance. So yes, it's not looking exactly good.
Speaker 1: But the US is in a similar situation as well.
Speaker 1: In the US we've seen a lot of big retailers,
Speaker 1: um nearing the brink of bankruptcy, I mean bad path
Speaker 1: and beyond we're expecting it to file within days. So
Speaker 1: that's I went into a bath and beyond. There you go.
Speaker 1: It's enormous on Sect Avenue. And that was the only persident.
Speaker 1: What were you looking for? I was looking for a mop.
Speaker 1: You're killing the dream you are killing. I didn't find
Speaker 1: a dream, by the way, so then I walked out
Speaker 1: and a half and ordered one on Amazon. There we go,
Speaker 1: There we go. Disclaimer disclaimer, Um, Katie, I guess the
Speaker 1: you know, as long as the labor market holds tight,
Speaker 1: so people will consume less. But the labor market is
Speaker 1: so tight in the UK because they can't find the
Speaker 1: staff that you could see maybe more of a pickup
Speaker 1: in consumer spending quicker than we think. Yes, And the
Speaker 1: key thing is you job numbers, people keeping their jobs. Um,
Speaker 1: So yeah, I think for example, whenever you talk to
Speaker 1: next Simon Wolfson. Next, there's these are the things he's
Speaker 1: looking at that we can keep employment high in the UK,
Speaker 1: then we can keep people spending to some extent um.
Speaker 1: And this year is going to be interesting one because
Speaker 1: it should be one of transformation, right, that's what we're
Speaker 1: hearing from the inflation figures. But later in the year
Speaker 1: we should really see purchases pick up again. So so
Speaker 1: we'll see what happens. But bath and Beyond, I mean,
Speaker 1: do we have any companies like this that could go under?
Speaker 1: I feel like the Brits are very much into their
Speaker 1: d I y and bathrooms. Yeah, I think in the
Speaker 1: UK will really like I mean the size and scope
Speaker 1: of bad bathroom beyond Like probably the thing that comes
Speaker 1: to closest is the supermarkets and that's what investors and
Speaker 1: the people in the credit community are really keeping their
Speaker 1: eye on at the moment. So we'll see how they
Speaker 1: weather the storm. And when you look at the debt
Speaker 1: pricing and what's happening in the in the markets where
Speaker 1: the warning signals is it is it's around the sup
Speaker 1: some of those bonds trading at really alarming levels. They
Speaker 1: are they are, I mean, especially when it comes to
Speaker 1: the UK. We've really hit the lows in September October,
Speaker 1: around the time when the market crisis tem from the
Speaker 1: mini budget really affected the British markets. But now they've
Speaker 1: recovered a little bit, but the ones that people are
Speaker 1: worried about are still trading at deeply distressed levels. I
Speaker 1: feel like everyone, like everyone I know and their mother
Speaker 1: and their cousin and their second cousin removed, has been
Speaker 1: to the power Battersey power station. So are we sharping?
Speaker 1: Are we expecting now an experience? So it's it's not
Speaker 1: sharping malls somewhere where you go and eat and maybe
Speaker 1: brows instead of you go to a shop with a purpose. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's all about experience now. So as we've been discussing,
Speaker 1: you know, we've seen so many retailers boarded up and
Speaker 1: what retailers really want to have as some fantastic restaurants
Speaker 1: and bars and cafes right next to their store. Um,
Speaker 1: we're also seeing, for example, retailers bringing services and experiences
Speaker 1: into store. So for example, jim Shark, the fitness brand,
Speaker 1: opened up their new store on Regent Street not that lago,
Speaker 1: and they have I think it's called the sweat Room.
Speaker 1: Actually which is quite sort of visual, but they offer
Speaker 1: fitness classes inside the store. Um and this is really
Speaker 1: too sort of promote what my daughter did last weekend.
Speaker 1: She had a birthday party at Westfield, not to shop,
Speaker 1: but to do roller roller booting with the kind of
Speaker 1: sort of house music. And they get them all in there,
Speaker 1: and there's and it's packed sold out for weeks this place.
Speaker 1: And then when you're there you might then go into
Speaker 1: Zara or you might do something else. But that is
Speaker 1: the reason, that's the only reason to go to We'll
Speaker 1: go to cinema or go to check out the restaurants. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's got to be in experience with all of
Speaker 1: these these items on offer. Really, and so how does
Speaker 1: that change the shopping centers? Actually, I mean how does
Speaker 1: it change or we can see more shopping centers and
Speaker 1: empty high streets. Well, hopefully those sites that are vacated
Speaker 1: by the retailers will be taken by the likes of
Speaker 1: restaurants and bars. And for example, Julie, I think you're
Speaker 1: mentioning McLaren as well. You know, we're seeing all these
Speaker 1: brands we wouldn't expect to see on our high street
Speaker 1: that range rover Land Rover whoever it might be at
Speaker 1: Tesla I think have have a store in brent Cross,
Speaker 1: so you know it's this idea of trying to get
Speaker 1: shoppers in to check out the cars, maybe also have
Speaker 1: an experience. You're not if you're buying a Tesla. You're
Speaker 1: not going to go to brink A Cross to buy,
Speaker 1: are you? Or maybe you want go to brint Cross
Speaker 1: to by Tesla's they do breaking news. Why why would
Speaker 1: you like to Cross to buy a Tesla? Don't want
Speaker 1: to be mean about brant Cross. You want the experience
Speaker 1: to go with it. How does the how does they
Speaker 1: lit I mean doing forecast? Is we get some big
Speaker 1: names going bust again? I mean, what's your sense talking
Speaker 1: to people in the market, talking to the people trading
Speaker 1: the bonds and thinking about the refinancing of these companies.
Speaker 1: You know the Bank of England talks about maybe things
Speaker 1: are going to be a little bit rosier this year
Speaker 1: than they said last year. What's your what's your sense?
Speaker 1: I definitely think it's going to be a matter of
Speaker 1: the healthiest firms are going to survive while the weaker
Speaker 1: one are definitely gonna have to face are going to
Speaker 1: face issues. I think if you're a dead investor and
Speaker 1: you have all these like British names and they're very
Speaker 1: retail and consumer ented focus, because that's how the composition
Speaker 1: of the British m john created the debt market. Is
Speaker 1: you're gonna want to pick the healthiest ones, the ones
Speaker 1: that have lower amounts of dead, ones that have just
Speaker 1: better cash generation, and so you can pick and choose,
Speaker 1: and the ones that you're not going to choose, the
Speaker 1: ones that are not appealing, are definitely going to have
Speaker 1: to face a wake up call. And this did not
Speaker 1: happen in the pandemic because despite the shops were being
Speaker 1: were closed for so long, it was really easy to
Speaker 1: act as emergency liquidity. You had the government supporting you.
Speaker 1: You could act as you know, five million of new
Speaker 1: bonds at three percent interest rate. Now this is definitely
Speaker 1: not a possibility anymore. One of the things that we
Speaker 1: should also sort of take into account when it comes
Speaker 1: to retail in the environment at the moment is that
Speaker 1: it's a big opportunity for these alternative lenders. So when
Speaker 1: retailers can't turn to their banks, you know, we're seeing
Speaker 1: these guys like Bountry Bay backed by Elliott and Hilco
Speaker 1: you know, they've recently come in and been lending. Bountry
Speaker 1: was two super Dry and Hilco was to Wilco. There's
Speaker 1: a nice little rhyme and yeah, it's an opportunity for
Speaker 1: them right to come in where the banks won't go.
Speaker 1: And and private equity, I mean, I always feel like
Speaker 1: if you'll get the you know, famous brands that we
Speaker 1: all know on the high street, at some point they've
Speaker 1: been owned by private equity, if not now. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: definitely a theme that we're seeing. I mean, last year
Speaker 1: it was really difficult to access financing for biots, but
Speaker 1: now credit markets are looking a little bit healthier for
Speaker 1: strong sponsors that are looking to buy debt. So we're
Speaker 1: expecting private equity firms to turn their attention to UK
Speaker 1: retailers again because they can really buy them at cheaper prices. Now. Opportunity,
Speaker 1: there's opportunity in distress, there is. You just have to,
Speaker 1: you know, as I said before, like get ready for
Speaker 1: digesting a lot of risk and the pick and choose
Speaker 1: really which ones you believe can have a healthier outlook.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thanks for listening to this week's in the City.
Speaker 1: We will be back next week, but in the meantime.
Speaker 1: If you like our show, please head on over to
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts and rate, review,
Speaker 1: and subscribe. This episode was hosted by Me, David Merritt
Speaker 1: and Me Franci Laqua. It was produced by Summers Audi,
Speaker 1: additional editing by Blake Maples and special thanks to Julia
Speaker 1: Morpurgo and Katie Lindsel. Find more stories like this one
Speaker 1: featured in our The Brink newsletter, chronicling corporate distress and
Speaker 1: turnaround stories. Sign up at bloomber dot com Stash newsletters,
Speaker 1: or via the show notes. We have to say it
Speaker 1: a bit more dramatically, The Brink