The planned hike in the minimum wage due to take effect in April is expected to hit pub and beer business Marston's to the tune of up to £3 million, the company has said.

It said the 6.2% increase to £8.72 an hour for workers 25 years and above and a 6.5% increase for those aged 21 to 24, is "higher than anticipated and will increase second half-year costs by a further £2 million to £3 million".

The warning comes as the chain, which has 1,400 pubs, revealed a strong Christmas fortnight, although this was offset by "subdued trading" at the start to December "as a consequence of poor weather".

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Ahead of its annual shareholder meeting on Friday morning, the company also revealed pub sales during the 16 weeks to January 18 were up 1% - although during the two weeks over Christmas, like-for-like sales rose 4.5%.

On its beer business at the Marston's Brewery in Burton, the company said the amount sold is slightly down, due to weak sales of its lager through supermarkets and high street stores, rather than in pubs - although overall sales remain in line with expectations.

Chief executive Ralph Findlay said: "Trading in the key Christmas fortnight was good and has remained solid since which is encouraging."

He added: "Looking forward, greater clarity on the political agenda should positively impact consumer confidence.

"Overall the economic environment for the consumer looks encouraging with low unemployment and healthy wage growth providing us with increasing confidence that the market will grow in 2020."

He also said a planned debt reduction strategy is ahead of targets to cut borrowings by £200 million by 2023.

Marston's pointed out: "In the year to date, we have completed or exchanged on £60 million of disposals.

"Having originally targeted £40 million of disposal proceeds, we increased that to £70 million in November 2019 and today further increase the target to £85 million to £90 million."

The competition watchdog's surprise probe into the merger of Just Eat and Dutch outfit Takeaway.com is "shocking and clearly unwarranted", a major shareholder said as the deal was delayed for a week.

Cat Rock Capital, the activist investor behind the ousting of a former Just Eat chief executive, said that the deal would make the market more competitive.

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The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) confirmed on Thursday it was planning an investigation into the £6 billion takeover.

Alex Captain, the founder of Cat Rock, called the CMA's decision to open a probe "shocking".

"Takeaway.com has no UK operations, exited its minor business there over three years ago, and has stated that it had no intention to enter the UK market before the Just Eat merger," he said.

The unexpected decision to open the probe came more than six months after Just Eat and Takeaway announced their plans to combine.

Online delivery giant Amazon is already facing an in-depth CMA probe into its £440 million investment in Deliveroo.

Mr Captain, who called on the watchdog to conclude its investigation quickly, said: "The CMA's investigation seems to draw a false equivalence between Takeaway.com's merger with Just Eat and Amazon's investment in Deliveroo.

"Amazon has a large UK business with millions of customers that it could leverage to re-enter the UK online food delivery market and increase competition."

Cat Rock owns around 3% of Just Eat's shares.

On Friday morning Takeaway said it would delay the takeover timetable by a week because of the CMA's announcement.

It added that more than 90% of Just Eat shareholders had accepted its bid, which became unconditional two weeks ago.

It is the latest bump in the road for a deal which has proven a headache for Takeaway's executives.

Shortly after the two companies announced their plans in early August last year, Prosus, an Amsterdam-listed company, tried to muscle in.

The two battled it out for months, trying to win over Just Eat's investors until January 10, when Takeaway declared victory.

EasyHotel slipped to a loss for the full year as the company faced a major writedown over a new hotel, the budget chain said.

Loss before tax hit £3.6 million in the 12 months ending September 30, following a £870,000 profit the year before.

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Converting an old listed building in Ipswich proved more complicated than had first been thought, the company said, as builders ran into several issues.

As a result, easyHotel took a £3 million non-cash impairment on the hotel, which opened in January last year.

Revenue grew 56% to £17.6 million, the business said.

Adjusted earnings before interest, tax depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) reached £4.2 million, a 42% rise.

Interim chief executive Scott Christie said: "EasyHotel has demonstrated the strength and resilience of its super-budget model, continuing to outperform a challenging market on a like-for-like basis over the course of the year."

The hotel chain, which offers rooms from £19, said it opened another six sites during the year. These added 607 rooms to its portfolio, and are performing about as well as had been expected.

The business is already planning an extra 2,006 rooms, including a £40 million investment in non-franchised new hotels.

The company announced earlier this month that Mr Christie will give way to a permanent chief when Francois Bacchetta joins from easyJet.

The hotel chain was founded in 2005 by Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, the entrepreneur behind easyJet.

It was thrust into the centre of a takeover battle last year when Sir Stelios blocked an attempt by Luxembourg group ICAMAP to take the firm private.

The founder, who still owns 28% of easyHotel, was able to stop the full takeover which would have removed its shares from the London Stock Exchange. ICAMAP now owns nearly 69% of shares in the business.