Appointed Regis Schultz as CEO JD Sports has announced the appointment of Regis Schultz as CEO. He will join in September, at which time Kath Smith will resume her former role as Senior Independent director on the Board after a short transitionary position. Mr Schultz has a wealth of retail, international and digital experience as well as a strong track record of effecting transformational change via digitalisation and multi-channel growth strategies. He joins from Al-Futtaim Group where he has been President of Retail since 2019. Prior to that he was CEO of Monoprox and Darty, as well as holding senior positions at BUT and B&Q. Valuation very undemanding We believe the appointment of a new CEO should start to help restore investor confidence in the JD story. The group’s shares are trading on what we consider to be a very undemanding valuation (CY22 PE 10.4x; CY23E 10.0x) with a disconnect, in our view, between the market valuation and JD’s proven track record, the strength of its global proposition and the multitude of exciting long term growth opportunities available to it. We believe the increasingly challenging consumer environment is more than discounted and see material upside to the share price. Next news will be 1H results in mid-September (date yet to be confirmed), which we expect to show another solid performance. We forecast 1H23E PBT of £370m. Management has guided to an H1:H2 profit split, with H1 having c.35%-40% of FY PBT, more in-line with historic splits, which implies a £335m to £383m range on FY23 consensus. Management has already reported robust trading for the 1st 5 months of 1H, with total Group LFL sales up 5% (ex the key acquisitions of DTLR and MIG). Reiterate BUY.