Morrisons has delivered a powerful set of profit and sales figures for the full year to February 3, on the same day chairman Sir Ken Morrison retired and was made honorary president.

The Bradford-based grocer’s pre-tax profit soared 66 per cent to£612 million.

Morrisons delivered total sales up 6 per cent to£13 billion and like-for-like sales – excluding fuel – up 4.6 per cent.

However, Morrisons sales are understood to have accelerated in the second half of the year, partly driven by a successful advertising campaign featuring celebrities Lulu, Alan Hansen and Denise Van Outen.

According to TNS Worldpanel, Morrisons sales rose 11.3 per cent, bringing its market share to 11.5 per cent, for the 12 weeks to January 27.

Morrisons also revealed it will return surplus capital of£1 billion to shareholders. Blue Oar analyst Greg Lawless said: “Strong preliminary results from Morrisons, which were slightly ahead of consensus and our own optimistic forecast. Yet again, Morrison over-delivers – this is the fourth time in the last six months. Strong cash generation has allowed net debt to fall by almost£230m, and gearing is now only 12 per cent.”

Following Sir Ken’s retirement, deputy chairman Sir Ian Gibson will succeed him as non-executive chairman.

Gibson said: “We are proud to pay tribute to Sir Ken Morrison on his retirement and from the company after 55 years of inspirational and dedicated leadership. During this time, he has transformed Morrisons from a small, family business into the UK’s fourth largest food retailer and a top five food producer, with 375 stores and 117,000 colleagues, serving over 9 million customers a week.”

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