Sainsbury's slumps into annual loss

Sainsbury's on Wednesday revealed it had plunged into an annual loss as Britain's biggest supermarkets face fierce competition from German-owned discounters Aldi and Lidl.

Mirroring a situation at Britain's biggest retailer Tesco, Sainsbury's said it had taken a sizeable writedown on the value of its property after slashing future earnings potential.

"The UK marketplace is changing faster than at any time in the past 30 years which has impacted our profits, like-for-like sales and market share," Sainsbury's chief executive Mike Coupe said in the company's results statement.

Sainsbury's posted a loss after tax of £166 million ($253 million, 225 million euros) for the year to March 14 compared with net profit of £716 million in 2013/14.

Underlying pre-tax profit slid 14.7 percent to £681 million, the group's first such fall in a decade.

Sainsbury's said it had taken an impairment charge of £628 million linked to the value of existing property and a withdrawal from planned store openings.