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Week Ahead: Marks & Spencer crossing the Amazon

Published: 16:56 29 Mar 2015 AEDT

mands350

In a shortened week because of Good Friday, Thursday's update from Marks & Spencer is probably the company we'll be reading about in the City pages on our day off.

After the firm ran into distribution difficulties in its fiscal third quarter, the General Merchandise (GM) division will be in focus more than ever.

Investec is forecasting a quarter-on-quarter improvement in GM sales, thanks to some soft comparative figures from a year earlier.

It is going for a like-for-like (LFL) sales decline in the fourth quarter of 0.4% in the GM division, which is a substantial improvement on the 5.8% decline in the third quarter.

As has been the case for years now, the food side of things is looking a lot healthier, and here Investec tips a 0.3% year-on-year increase in LFL sales, up from 0.1% in the third quarter.

"A sequential improvement in GM performance is expected now the online distribution issues seen in 3Q15 have been resolved. In addition online annualised the transfer from the Amazon platform in February (the start of its performance issues last year) and is up against easier comparables. We expect Food to have outperformed a tough competitive backdrop and may have benefited from the recent underlying improvement in market conditions," the broker said.

Truly dedicated UK traders will be logging on to catch the market-moving US jobless figures for March on Good Friday.

Significant announcements expected 

Monday 

Finals: Instem (LON:INS), Learning Technologies Group (LON:LTG), Outsourcery (LON:OUT), Plant Health Care (LON:PHC), Central Asia Metals (LON:CAML), AA (LON:AA.), XLMedia (LON:XLM), Al Noor Hospitals Group (LON:ANH).

Trading statement: Compass Group (LON:CPG)

Economic: UK - Mortgage approvals, Net consumer credit. EU - Eurozone industrial confidence, Eurozon economic confidence. US - Personal income, Personal spending, Personal consumption expenditure, Pending home sales

Tuesday

Finals: Ocean Wilson Holdings (LON:OCN), LiDCO Group (LON:LID), Kingfisher (LON:KGF), Chesnara (LON:CSN), e-Therapeutics (LON:ETX).

Interims: James Halstead (LON:JHD), Inland Homes (LON:INL)

Trading statement: Thomas Cook Group (LON:TCG), MITIE Group (LON:MTO).

Economic: UK - GfK Consumer confidence, Gross domestic product. EU - Eurozone unemployment, Eurozone consumer prices. US - Consumer confidence.

Wednesday

Finals: Evraz (LON:EVR)

Interims: ASOS (LON:ASC)

Trading statement: FirstGroup (LON:FGP)

Economic: UK - Markit PMI manufacturing. US - MBA mortgage applications, ADP employment change, Markit PMI manufacturing

Thursday

Finals: Forbidden Technologies (LON:FBT)

Trading statement: Dunelm Group (LON:DNLM), Tate & Lyle (LON:TATE), Booker Group (LON:BOK), Marks & Spencer Group (LON:MKS)

Economic: UK - Markit/CPS construction PMI. US - Initial jobless claims, Trade balance, Factory orders

Friday

Market holiday (Good Friday)

Economic: US - Non-farm payrolls, Unemployment rate

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