Hotel Chocolat down after trading news

High street confectioner Hotel Chocolat (LON:HOTC) has seen its shares drop to 325p (as of 14:55 BST) after announcing an expansion of its credit facilities. Management said that this came alongside cost and cash control mechanisms to face the current climate. Key Easter trading was negatively impacted by the closure of all stores, but this was partially mitigated by stronger direct to consumer sales via digital channels.

CEO Angus Thirlwell commented: “Hotel Chocolat is a strong brand with differentiated products, a loyal customer base, and a vertically integrated direct-to-consumer business mode, built for agility. It is a reflection of these attributes that we have been able to add additional banking cover to the over-subscribed equity placement in March. The financial headroom gives us greater resilience against ongoing disruption and enables us to move onwards with longer-term growth opportunities.

[…] Every day at Easter the online demand exceeded the quantity of orders we could accept, due to the requirements to ensure safe working, combined with the short adjustment period. With the plans we are putting in place over the next months, we aim to be able to switch the vast majority of demand to online should the need arise in the future“.