M&S says it will respond to April cyberattack by accelerating digital transformation plans

“We are focused on recovery, restoring our systems, operations, and customer proposition over the rest of the first half, with the aim of exiting this period a much stronger business,” he added.

Despite the staggering impact on profits, by some distance the largest sum ever publicly admitted to by a UK company as a result of a cyberattack, shareholders will take some comfort that Machin believes the final cost of the incident “will be reduced through management of costs, insurance, and other trading actions.” He said that these costs will be “presented separately as an adjusting item.”

This, of course, currently doesn’t factor in any costs arising from any legal action around the customer data breach it admitted to having suffered during the attack.