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British luxury brand Burberry reported faster than expected sales growth in its financial first quarter but warned a strong pound would hit this year's profits. Burberry reported retail revenue of 370 million pounds ($629.6 million) for the three months to June 30, which beat analyst forecasts of around 350 million pounds. Sales growth reached 12 percent on a like-for-like basis, compared to an 8 percent consensus analyst forecast. Bigger luxury labels such as Louis Vuitton and Gucci have seen retail sales growth collapse to below 5 percent from above 10 percent three years ago as consumers tired of global brands they saw as too ubiquitous. Burberry, known for its camel trenchcoats, has kept sales growing in China, unlike rivals that suffered more from a crackdown on corruption and conspicuous spending. But sterling's strength is taking its toll on the company's earnings power. Burberry's fixed costs are in pounds and its revenue comes in a variety of currencies.

German retailer Metro AG said it wants to hold on to Europe's biggest electronics chain Media-Saturn despite a fight for control with Erich Kellerhals, the founder and minority owner. "Media-Saturn has great potential to grow. On the board, we are all of the opinion that we should not part with it," Metro Chief Executive Olaf Koch told journalists at an event late on Wednesday. Metro is majority owner of Media-Saturn, the world's second-biggest consumer electronics chain after Best Buy Co Inc . It has been fighting for control for years with Kellerhals, who still owns a 22 percent stake and who said in May he wanted to buy back the business. Metro lifted its holding in Media-Saturn to 78 percent last year when it bought an extra 3 percent stake from co-founder Leopold Stiefel for about 230 million euros. That valued the whole company, which accounts for about a third of Metro's sales, at more than 7 billion euros ($9.55 billion). Industry sources told Reuter

Japanese apparel supplier Fast Retailing Co cut its full-year net profit forecast more than 10 percent to account for losses at a premium denim brand, even as strong sales in its flagship Uniqlo stores helped third-quarter operating profit grow 21 percent, in line with forecasts. Asia's biggest fashion retailer cut its full-year net profit target on Thursday to 78 billion yen ($768 million), down from 88 billion yen, to account for a possible 10 billion yen impairment loss on its J Brand U.S. jeans operation. Fast Retailing paid $290 million to buy an 80 percent stake in J Brand late in 2012, with label managers holding on to the remaining stake. "We weren't effective enough in competing in the increasingly tough premium denim market," Chief Financial Officer Takeshi Okazaki told a news conference in Tokyo. The persistent loss at J Brand highlights the potential risks of scooping up non-homegrown brands for Fast Retailing in its drive for international growth. Amb

The export of hidden Chinese tin stocks is likely to be behind a puzzling rise in London Metal Exchange (LME) inventories that has frustrated investors who expected to see shortages this year. At the start of the year, tight supply-demand fundamentals led to numerous forecasts that tin prices would rise. But prices are down half a percent so far this year and have shed nearly 7 percent since touching a peak in April, weighed down partly by rising inventories. Full data are not available, but analysts say that the apparently well supplied market is due to hidden stocks in China that are making their way onto the international market, while demand has been weaker than forecast. Analysts polled by Reuters in April expected the cash LME tin price to average $23,360 a tonne this year, compared with the current price of $22,200. But instead of a scarcity of tin, stocks in warehouses monitored by the LME MSNSTX-TOTAL have surged by nearly 50 percent since Feb. 27, confounding investors

The London Metal Exchange and technology firm Autilla joined forces on Wednesday to propose an electronic system for setting the global silver price benchmark as the deadline neared for replacing London's century-old silver fix. The 117-year-old price benchmark, or fix, will come to an end on Aug. 14, operator London Silver Market Fixing Limited said in May, as regulatory scrutiny of price-setting intensifies across markets. The silver fix is set every day at noon by three banks via a conference call, working out a price at which their customers are willing to buy and sell the metal. The London Bullion Market Association (LBMA) has consulted with market participants since May with the aim of producing a transparent electronic alternative to the conference call that complies with toughened regulatory standards. "Throughout the LBMA's process, the market has consistently indicated that Autilla's technology and the LME's compliance and price discovery systems ar

Russian state-owned development bank Vnesheconombank (VEB) said on Wednesday it would not take part in a bailout of indebted miner Mechel, extinguishing hopes for a convertible bond scheme that was seen as its most likely lifeline. The loss-making coal to steel group, hit by weak prices for its products, is in critical need of government support. With debts of $8.6 billion, Mechel, co-owned by billionaire Igor Zyuzin, has already gone through several debt restructurings with creditor banks. Russia nursed its oligarch-owned conglomerates through the 2008-09 global crisis, avoiding a wave of defaults. Mechel piled on more debt to pay for acquisitions, only to be hit by an industry slump that left it with a devalued asset portfolio. In June Economy Minister Alexei Ulyukayev said the government was considering implementing a 180-billion rouble ($5.3 billion) scheme that would involve a convertible bond, which could be purchased by state development bank Vnesheconombank, or VEB. Howev

SSP Group has priced its London float at 210 pence per share, the bottom of its revised range, giving the owner of Upper Crust and Caffe Ritazza a market valuation of just under 1 billion pounds ($1.7 billion), the Telegraph reported on Wednesday. _0"> The price range for SSP's IPO-SSPG.L initial public listing had be narrowed twice, with the final refined range being between 210 pence per share to 215 pence per share, the daily said, without naming sources. ( bit.ly/1zpIKWK ) The paper had earlier on Tuesday reported that the food and beverage company's price range had been narrowed to between 210 pence per share and 230 pence per share, from between 200 pence per share and 240 pence per share. SSP, which is headed by retail veteran Kate Swann, could not immediately be reached for a comment outside of regular business hours in the UK. ($1 = 0.5877 British Pounds) (Reporting by Esha Vaish in Bangalore, editing by Louise Heavens)