Dixons and Comet banking on a World Cup bounce

John Browett, the chief executive of the electronics group DSG, will tell the market if his firm has enjoyed a World Cup bounce, when he reports preliminary results on Thursday.

Retailers such as DSG, which operates through the Dixons brand on the high street, and Kesa, which runs Comet and also reports this week, have been offering cut-price deals to lure in new customers looking to watch the football from South Africa in HD.

But the pair will be mindful of numbers from Home Retail, the owner of Argos, which last month showed disappointing sales of HD TVs.

The Travel firms Carnival, which operates luxury cruiseliners such as the recently launched Azura, costing £80m to build, and Stagecoach, the buses-to-trains operator, also deliver numbers to the market this week.

Carnival will report its performance for the second quarter of the year on Tuesday, but analysts will be hoping to glean more information about the impact that the oil spillage in the Gulf of Mexico will have on cruises in the region.

Also on Tuesday, Whitbread, the former pubs chain now better known for its Costa Coffee and Premier Inn brands, issues an interim management statement.