Explained - What Avenue Supermarts said on the analyst call that led to the stock tanking 6%

Shares of Avenue Supermarts Ltd., parent company of the hypermarket chain D-Mart, fell over 6% on Tuesday, July 28, tracking weak management commentary during its meeting with a group of analysts. This is the biggest single-day fall for Avenue Supermarts in a single session since October 2024.



During the analyst meet, D-Mart's management said that they want to grow their store count by 15% of the base, which comes up to around 75 stores, which appears to be marginally lower than what the street was anticipating. The estimates were between 80 stores to 100 stores.

The management also called quick-commerce is a structural threat and saw no major revival in the Same Store Sales Growth in a big way in the coming years, analysts present at the meet told CNBC-TV18.

Currently, D-Mart reported same store sales growth of 5% during the June quarter.

Analysts also highlighted the management's commentary of adding 80-100 stores going ahead, stating that the outlook on new store additions has not improved yet.

Avenue Supermarts also plans on increasing the share of leased stores, potentially due to pressure on Operating Cash Flow and Free Cash Flow, the analysts highlighted.

As a result of this, analysts anticipate a possible low-single-digit cut to Avenue Supermarts' earnings estimates.

Currently, Avenue Supermarts is being tracked by 31 analysts, of which, only 11 of them have a "buy" rating on the stock, 12 say "hold", and eight have a "sell" rating.

Shares of Avenue Supermarts are trading 5.7% lower on Tuesday at ₹3,798. With this fall, the stock has trimmed its year-to-date gains to just 2.5%.