Market Watch: Topps Tiles hoping for sustained housing recovery

In March, the UK's largest tile and wood flooring specialist reported like-for-like sales increased by 1.8 per cent in its first half, down slightly on the previous year.

Business has been boosted by homeowners choosing to do up their homes rather than move, but the benefit of this may be wearing off as Topps saw a slowdown in the second quarter after a good first three months.

The interim figures will be keenly watched to see if it has reversed that trend especially as competition increases and as chains such as B&Q expand their range.

The group, which has a total market share of about 25 per cent, added total first-half sales would be 89.2 million, compared to 91.4m a year earlier, though there was an additional week in the comparable half. Sales rose by 1.5 per cent after allowing for an extra week.

Despite the tough background, Topps is adding to its chain and it should confirm it has 320 stores open, up from 313 in March.

Consensus forecasts for the full year are for profits of 17.3m, up from an adjusted 16.3m last year.

The recent history of Plumb Center and Build Center owner Wolseley is littered with profits warnings, restructuring and closures, but the company signalled steadier times in March when it returned to the dividend list.

The builders' merchant, which posts a third-quarter update on Wednesday, also moved back into the black with profits of 195m in the six months to January, against a 261m loss a year earlier.

The UK business, with more than 1,400 branches, also put in an improved performance with like-for-like sales up 6 per cent and trading profits up 55 per cent to 51m.

There was also improved trading in the US, but analysts are concerned that new house building will remain subdued because of poor employment and problems with mortgage lending.

The US accounts for 40 per cent of the business and recent downbeat quarterly results from Lowe's, its nearest rival in the US, which did not meet Wall Street's expectations, have added to the unease.

Bad weather derailed Hornby late last year but the model railways group should be more upbeat looking forward.

The current year will get the full benefit of Hornby's Olympics products, which it has now started to roll out and includes a range of different coloured London taxis with all of the various events - such as rhythmic gymnastics and archery - represented on the side.

Racing model arm Scalextric also has a new a range of products based on the forthcoming Disney/Pixar movie "Cars 2", which is due for release during the summer, while the continued success of Formula One's Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button should keep interest high in its F1 models.Andrew Wade, an analyst at house broker Numis, cut his profit forecast for the full year to March to 4.6m from 6.4m, but maintained his forecast for 2012 at 7.8m to reflect a full year of Olympics merchandise sales.

Improving global car sales should put a healthy sheen on Johnson Matthey's full-year figures on Thursday.

Johnson makes a third of all the filters, or catalysts, used to sift out pollutants in car exhausts, and is a big supplier of pollution filters for buses and lorries.

Its precious metals division, which refines and markets platinum, is also tipped for a good year on the back of buoyant metal prices for the period concerned.

This, and growth in demand from car makers, should underpin a rise in full-year underlying profits of more than a third for the year to March.

The consensus market forecast is for a total before tax of 340m, up from 254m last year.