Frasers Group – the United Kingdom retail group that manages the likes of Sports Direct – has extended its ongoing takeover bid of Australia’s Accent Group again, this time for the next four months to January 29, 2027.
Frasers initially launched its takeover bid of Accent Group – the company behind the likes of Hype DC, Platypus and The Athlete’s Foot – on June 15, offering shareholders $0.65 per share. Accent Group quickly retorted, telling its shareholders to reject the bid. The initial offer period was until July 30. Frasers then extended the offer period until September 30 after it appeared that none of Accent’s shareholders budged on the offer. Even up to today, no budging has yet to be noted.
This is the second time Frasers has extended its bid offer, with the extension not including a change to the offer price of $0.65. Since the initial offer launch on June 15, Accent’s share price has mostly hovered above $0.70 per share, but recently dipped to around $0.66 per share last week before swinging back slightly to $0.68 per share.
Accent Group is not the only company facing a takeover by Frasers this year. The UK retail group also managed to bump up its stake in Hugo Boss to 48 per cent, allowing the company to install Frasers CEO Michael Murray to Boss' supervisory board.
In 2025, Frasers also came after Boohoo Group – now named Debenhams Group – which manages the likes of Debenhams, Karen Millen, PrettyLittleThing and Boohoo. Frasers planned to grow its influence on the company, however this doesn't appear to have been as successful as its venture with Boss.
Amid the takeover bid of Accent Group, the footwear conglomerate reported its FY26 results in August, which showed a 69.1 per cent drop in its statutory earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) to $34 million, driven down by a non-cash impairment charge, losses from closed businesses, restructuring costs and advisor costs related to the takeover bid by Frasers Group.
Accent Group decided to issue an impairment charge of $48.6 million, with the board citing the current macroeconomic environment, recent trading conditions and that the group's market capitalisation remains below its net asset value.
The goodwill impairment is a non-cash item and has no impact on the company's operating cash flows, dividend capacity, banking covenants or liquidity position.
“Notwithstanding this decision, the company continues to have a clear future growth plan and the impairment does not in any way reflect the board’s confidence in the strategic growth initiatives of the company, as laid out in the 2030 Strategic Growth Plan,” Accent Group shared in its annual report.
The footwear company also closed the remaining underperforming Glue stores and the OzSale online business. Distribution agreements for Dickies, Herschel and Superga were discontinued in FY26.
Accent noted these businesses collectively contributed losses of approximately $17.8 million in FY26.
Earnings were also hit by $4.88 million in costs relating to “restructuring” as well as advisory costs to help defend against the takeover bid by Frasers Group. It is unclear what the restructuring costs involved.
At the bottom line, Accent’s statutory net profit fell into the red to minus $13.8 million, falling from a positive $57.7 million in FY25.
Minus significant items and excluding tax, Accent’s underlying NPAT for FY26 hit a positive $51 million, which would have been a slight drop of 7.8 per cent on last year.
Despite the snag to Accent’s bottom line, the business reported a $14 million lift to its total sales – including The Athlete’s Foot franchises – hitting $1.635 billion. Owned sales – excluding franchises – lifted by $69 million to just over $1.5 billion.
The company also issued a dividend for FY26, at 4.5 cents per share, which is down from 7 cents per share in FY25.
"FY26 was a year of significant strategic progress for Accent Group despite a challenging macroeconomic backdrop,” CEO Daniel Agostinelli said. “We completed the closure of loss-making businesses, launched and expanded Sports Direct, continued the TAF franchise reacquisition program, and released our 2030 Strategic Growth Plan.
“Whilst the consumer environment remained challenging, the business delivered underlying EBIT of $105.3 million and is well positioned for FY27.”