Retail sector to dominate City results

RETAIL remains centre-stage this week, with trading performance superceding the recent flurry of high street flotations, such as Poundland and Pets at Home, as the main focus of interest.

Brian Brick is expected to put together a pleasing results and dividends ensemble. Picture: Contributed

With spring having formally arrived last Thursday, DIY tends to be come a point of interest for many consumers, and B&Q-owner Kingfisher will be one of the highlights of the week.

Attention also tends to turn to holidays, and travel operator Thomas Cook will be updating the City on the health of the market.

Chancellor George Osborne said in last week’s Budget that Britain’s economy was far healthier than it has been for years, and the next reference point for such a claim is Friday’s official GDP figures.

Today

l • Allergy Therapeutics – The pharma group specialising in allergy vaccines posts its interim results. The company made a profit of about £500,000 at the full-year stage.

Tomorrow

• Kingfisher – The DIY giant is expected to announce a 4 per cent rise in yearly profits to £742 million for the year to January, with the tailwind for its B&Q subsidiary being the upturn in the UK housing market. This compares with a profit of £715m a year before.

• Inflation – Latest CPI figures are expected to edge up 1.7 per cent year-on-year.

• AG Barr – The Cumbernauld-based soft drinks business is set to deliver strong annual results following the failure of its merger with Britvic last year.

• Scottish Property Federation – Annual conference, Our Dynamic Earth, Edinburgh

Wednesday

• Moss Bros – the menswear fashion retailer publishes full-year results that are expected to impress after a Christmas sales surge. Last month’s update also promised investors a bumper dividend, as the group revealed like-for-like sales rose nearly 13 per cent in the five weeks to 11 January. Cantor Fitzgerald forecasts Moss’s profits will have jumped a third to £4m.

Thursday

• Thomas Cook – Summer bookings at the travel operator will be the focus as chief executive Harriet Green updates on the latest stage of the group’s turnaround plan. First-quarter losses at Thomas Cook for the period to end-December fell £10m to £56m despite the impact of Egyptian political turmoil on bookings.

• Institute of Directors Scotland – The tenth director of the year awards are held at the Crowne Plaza, Glasgow, hosted by BBC Scotland presenter Kaye Adams.

• Summerhall Distillery – The gin distillery is the first to open in Edinburgh for more than 150 years.

Friday

• Economy – Fourth-quarter GDP figures are out from the Office for National Statistics. Howard Archer, economist at IHS Global Insight, expects quarter-on-quarter growth of 0.7 per cent.