COVID-19 is exposing the diverging fortunes of Australia’s corporate heavyweights, with $52 billion supermarket giant Woolworths struggling to keep stores fully stocked in Sydney and 10,000 staff facing disruption from rules limiting movement outside of local council areas.

But the retail giant is still delivering healthy profits, reporting a 20.1 per cent increase in net profit to $1.5 billion in 2020-21 from its Australian and New Zealand supermarkets, BIG W chain and digital businesses. The bottom-line net profit before adjusting for the demerger of its Endeavour Group climbed 78 per cent to $2.07 billion, surpassing most market forecasts.