France and Poland retail sales: what happened? Banque de France and Statistics Poland published June retail sales this morning. June represents the second month of Kingfisher''s Q2 (May-July). French industry DIY sales declined -2.6% year-on-year (comparable stores, non-seasonally adjusted), after rising +2.2% in May. Poland ''other'' sales category, which captures home improvement spending, also declined -4.0% year-on-year (at constant prices) following -10.8% in May. Last week UK Barclaycard data for the period 24 May - 27 June reported a Home Improvement category sales decline of -4.0% year-on-year which follows -0.9% in May. BNPP Exane View: negative DIY sales across core markets In Kingfisher''s Q1 sales update on 28 May, management attributed its strong like-for-like sales growth to seasonal demand, especially at BandQ, and cautioned against a potential demand pull-forward from Q2. Recent retail sales data in the UK, France, and Poland for Kingfisher''s Q2 (May-July) indicate a continued slowdown. As discussed in France wasn''t built in a day, Kingfisher UKandI often sees muted growth after a strong quarter, and Kingfisher France typically underperforms the French DIY industry. The latest company compiled-consensus models Q2 like-for-like sales growth for the group at +0.1% year-on-year, with the UK at +1.7%, France at -2.6%, and Poland at -0.8%. With one month still to trade, we see some downside risk to UK and Poland growth in particular. Valuation Kingfisher trades on CY25 P/E of 13.6x and CY26 P/E of 12.1x (at GBp 278, on our forecasts). We rate Kingfisher Underperform. Next news Kingfisher is scheduled to report H1 results on 23 September. See Figure 2 for latest company-compiled consensus H1 expectations. Recent research KINGFISHER, KINGFISHER ADR: France wasn''t built in a day Figure 1: Retail sales data / Figure 2: Kingfisher H1 expectations /