M&S customers warned of disruption until July after £300m blow

Marks and Spencer has said disruption from a major cyber attack is expected to continue through July and reduce operating profits by around £300 million before action to offset the hit. Investors will be hoping that can shed light on the impact of a damaging that has halted all online orders at the retail giant.

The company unveiled its financial performance for the past year in an update to the stock market on Wednesday. However, attention will be sharply focused on how the company is coping after weeks of disruption. It has been almost a month since the retailer was first impacted by a major "cyber incident" reported to be linked to hacking group Scattered Spider.

As a result, the company has paused online orders for the past three weeks, and payments and click-and-collect orders were also impacted.

M&S also saw availability in stores knocked by the disruption, causing some empty shelves as it changed parts of its IT systems. However, in an update on Thursday, it said this was recovering quickly.

Customer personal data, which could have included names, email addresses, postal addresses and dates of birth, was taken by hackers in the attack.

The retailer has not yet divulged the financial cost of the incident, but it is believed to have missed out on tens of millions of pounds in sales.

Analysts have said shareholders will be eagerly awaiting the firm's guidance on profits and revenues for the current year as a result.

Susannah Streeter, head of money and markets at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "Although the annual numbers won't show the effect, as they end before the outages of operations occurred, some guidance for the year ahead is expected, and it's likely to be very cautious indeed.

"With online orders still suspended, the breach is expected to be costing around £4 million a day in lost sales."

She added that fashion sales could be a particular casualty, with the disruption coming amid a spell of warm weather during a key period for spring/summer clothing lines.

Analysts at Barclays have suggested the cyber attack could result in a £200 million cost for the 2025/26 financial year, but that this is likely to be offset by an insurance payout of around £100 million.

The attack knocked the business down after a positive period under Stuart Machin's leadership. Shares struck an almost nine-year high last month before a recent drop in value.

According to sector analysts, M&S is expected to report that total group sales increased by around 5% to £13.8 billion for the year ended March 31.

The company is also expected to reveal pre-tax profit of around £840 million for the year. This compares with around £716 million a year earlier.