The boss of high street jewellery firm Ramsdens is expecting an upswing in workers selling their gold or pawning their jewellery for cash as coronavirus forces many businesses to close up shop and send staff home.
Peter Kenyon, who has led the business since 2008, said that demand for travel money had decreased because of the outbreak, but added other areas could do better.
鈥淎s a business, we have the benefit of offering diversified services to customers and, given the uncertainty, we anticipate an increasing need for our asset-backed pawnbroking and gold-buying services to support customers through potential short-term cash flow difficulties,鈥 he said.
In the same update, Ramsdens said that profit before tax will be in line with expectations when it reports for the year ending March 31.
He said pawnbroking and precious metals have performed well since the start of 2020.
But there has been a 鈥渟ignificant decline in customer demand鈥 for the foreign exchange arm of the business in recent weeks.
Ramsdens said it was difficult to predict the impact Covid-19 would have on its income, but there will be a 鈥渕aterial reduction鈥 in foreign exchange revenues in the near term.
Mr Kenyon said: 鈥淲e are in unprecedented times. The Covid-19 situation continues to evolve quickly and the extent and duration of its future impact across all areas of people鈥檚 lives is difficult to assess.
鈥淥ur first concern continues to be the wellbeing of our colleagues and our customers and we have taken actions to protect them.
鈥淎t the start of February, we were looking forward with optimism to accelerating our growth plans.
鈥淛ust a few weeks later, we have no visibility on how long the current international travel disruption will last and how this will impact our foreign exchange income stream in the year ahead.鈥
Looking ahead, the firm added that the group benefits from diversified income streams and a strong balance sheet, including approximately 拢10m of cash and an undrawn 拢10m revolving credit facility.
