£1bn profit for Hornby's Boots

Hornby, who was forced to resign from failed bank HBOS last year, will present Alliance Boots' preliminary results at a press conference at the firm's flagship branch in London's Oxford Street.

Hornby will present figures for the first time since he joined Boots as its chief executive last June.

The privately owned pharmacy and healthcare chain is also expected to report sales of more than 22.5bn in the year to the end of May. But the group is also still heavily weighed down by debt which backed the 1.1bn acquisition of the retail giant by private equity firm KKR and chairman Stefano Pessina in 2007.

Most recently the firm was estimated to have at least 9.6bn worth of debt on its balance sheet.

Tony Shiret, Credit Suisse's retail analyst, said its debt burden meant there was little prospect of the firm being refloated on public markets soon.

But he said private rather than public ownership was an "advantage" to Boots as management was focusing on the long term.

"They (KKR and Pessina] are not running the business as a short term financial flipper," Shiret said.

"They are going to be in there for a while and have to make sure it works properly.

"In a paradoxical way, Boots in public ownership had switched too far away from fundamentals to financials in my opinion. In private ownership, when that might be expected to carry on, my sense is it has become more focused on establishing fundamentals."

Shiret said Hornby's role at Boots – and his public debut tomorrow – offered him a chance to "show what he is all about".

"I am not going to say 'rehabilitation' but he's an able guy for this type of business. He's an asset," said Shiret.

Hornby's rehabilitation in the eyes of some City watchers will be followed by his delivery of a speech at the 2010 British Retail Consortium annual retail lecture in London on Tuesday.