Tuesday preview: Carpetright, Thorntons, GDP

27th Jun 2011 16:35

Headlines featuring carpet and floor coverings retailer Carpetright have contained the words "profit warning" far too often this year for the peace of mind of patient shareholders. "Tough trading conditions in the UK and Republic of Ireland continued into the fourth quarter of our financial year, with fragile consumer confidence producing a weak floor coverings market," company chairman, Lord Harris of Peckham, said back in late April.Consumer confidence and the UK housing market have shown little or no sign of improvement since then, so Carpetright's results announcement on Tuesday could be grim.The market is expecting the group to announce pre-tax profits of £17.0m, on sales of £489.3m.Jonathan Hart, chief executive of chocolate maker and retailer Thorntons, is one Briton who will not have enjoyed the sweltering start to the week, where temperatures hit 31 degrees celsius in London.Hart is set to unveil his strategic review of the Thorntons business to analysts and major shareholders at 11am on Tuesday 28 June 2011, some eight weeks after the company blamed scorching hot weather for an underwhelming performance over the key Easter period.The company's shares perked up on Monday after the company completed a refinancing and outsourced its distribution and warehousing activities to DHL.Thorntons expects the outsourcing to deliver a net benefit to Thorntons in excess of £5m over the length of the six year contract. One-off transition costs of up to £680,000 will be incurred in the first year of the contract. On the economic front, the final estimate of first quarter gross domestic product is expected to be left unchanged from the provisions reading of a 0.5% quarter-on-quarter gain and a 1.8% year-on-year gain. QUARTERLY PAYMENT DATEBP, Frontline Ltd.QUARTERLY EX-DIVIDEND DATEDow Chemical Co, Yamana Gold Inc.INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC ANNOUNCEMENTSConsumer Confidence (US) (15:00)GMSServoca, Sony Corp.FINALSACM Shipping Group, Carpetright, Daisy Group, Private & Commercial Finance Group, West Pioneer Properties Ltd. (DI)ANNUAL REPORTJZ Capital Partners Ltd.EGMSCharlemagne Capital Ltd., Hirco, RGI International Ltd.AGMSAstaire Group, Cellcast, Densitron Technologies, Energiser Investments, Evolve Capital, Global Energy Development, InternetQ, Investors Capital Trust 'A' Shares, JZ Capital Partners Ltd., Lipoxen, Mobile Tornado Group, NextGen Group, OSJC Transcontainer GDR (Reg S), Pacific Assets Trust, Prime People, Proton Power Systems, Real Estate Investors, Salamander Energy, Scotty Group, Sistema Hals JSC GDR (Reg S), Somero Enterprises Inc.(Reg S), Sound Oil, Tau Capital, TEG Group, Trans-Siberian Gold, Universe Group, Westminster Group, YCO GroupUK ECONOMIC ANNOUNCEMENTSBalance of Payments (09:30)Current Account (09:30)FINAL DIVIDEND PAYMENT DATEAnglo-Eastern PlantationsTRADING STATEMENTStandard Chartered--jh