Our Take: This is a stronger-than-expected statement from Next, even in the context of high expectations. Full price sales in the quarter rose 9.2% – ahead of Q2 guidance for +4%, and investor expectations for >+6%. Next has moved FY 27 PBT guidance higher (by 2%) to bank the Q2 sales and profit beat and also to capture a better performance from equity investments. In our view this update reads well for Marks & Spencer. While Next has beaten UK expetcations, this has been driven by LABEL, with stores and co ...