Next chief Lord Wolfson sells £30m worth of shares

The Next boss has sold almost £30 million worth of shares as he capitalized on the fashion company’s recent rally.

Lord Wolfson, the FTSE 100’s longest-serving chief executive and in post since August 2001, sold 290,000 shares for just over £100 each. That earned him £29.2 million.

After fine-tuning his portfolio, he now has around 950,000 shares, representing around 0.75 per cent of the shares on the High Street.

This leaves him with assets worth around £100 million. This isn’t the first time Wolfson has sold his shares.

He sold more than £10 million worth of shares in November 2020. Last week, shares hit a record high after the retailer said it would hit a £1 billion annual profit milestone within no time.

Over the past year, shares have risen 37 percent. Yesterday they fell by 3.5 percent. In a bullish update last week, Next shook off the gloom in the retail sector as it looked on course to post a £1 billion annual profit for the first time.

Profits are expected to reach £995 million for the year to the end of January.

This was the second time in two months that the FTSE 100 company has raised its annual guidance, after raising the figure by £20m to £980m in August.

The £1 billion mark is one that only a handful of other UK retailers have reached.

Tesco, Marks & Spencer and B&Q owner Kingfisher are the only other listed British retailers to rake in £1 billion in profits in a year.

The group is widely regarded as one of Britain’s most trusted retailers.

Wolfson has been praised for his careful leadership and his comments on the health of the economy are closely watched.

When he took the top job, he was the youngest CEO of a FTSE 100 company at the age of 33.

Wolfson, 56, is a Conservative peer, like his father, David, who was previously chairman of Next.