Myer and David Jones have been hit hard by the ongoing retail slump.Credit:Wayne Taylor
Kogan shares have climbed in parallel to the retailer's sales,tipping an all-time high of $13.00 on Friday and pushing Kogan's market capitalisation to over $1.2 billion for the first time. David Jones'market capitalisation is just under $1 billion while Myer's is around $217 million.
The company's founder and chief executive Ruslan Kogan believes the COVID-19 crisis has accelerated his long-held belief that e-commerce would be the future of Australian retail,warning bricks and mortar retailers could be left behind.
"We've got this environment now where our business leaders are starting to talk about e-commerce and online...and that leads to a changing of the guard,"he toldThe Age andThe Sydney Morning Herald.
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"There's definitely a lot of businesses out there that have enjoyed very cosy trading conditions,but customers are voting with their wallets and it's going to change."
The company has performed better than any other on the ASX's All Ordinaries index since the market plunged on February 20,up a remarkable 140 per cent. This has boosted the value of Mr Kogan's own 22 per cent stake in the company to around $265 million,and co-founder and chief financial officer David Shafer's 8.5 per cent stake to around $100 million.
While some of this success can be attributed to Kogan's online-only positioning in a world moving rapidly towards e-commerce,analysts have also picked out the company's record-low cost of doing business (CODB) as a major selling point for investors.