WH Smith’s share price falls as retailer reveals full year results to beat expectations

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WH Smith's share price nudged down as it said sales would beat expectations for the full year to the end of August, in a pre-close announcement issued this morning. 
 
The retailer said there had been a strong performance in its travel division during the second half, with “good sales across all of our core channels, reflecting continued investment in our key business initiatives and growth in passenger numbers”. 
 
The high street business traded in line with expectations, with sales slightly ahead “driven by some favourable publishing in books”. 
 
“We continue to deliver gross margin improvements and planned cost savings in line with our profit focused strategy.”
 
“Accordingly WH Smith expects the outcome for the year to 31 August 2015 to be slightly ahead of the consensus of analysts' expectations,” the company said. 
 
WH Smith's share price was down 1.6 per cent at pixel time.
 
The full year results will be out on 15 October. 
 
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