THE WEEK AHEAD

TODAY

Companies

No interims or finals are scheduled for the day, squeezed between the Christmas and New Year's holidays. Intrepid shareholders may want to venture out to the annual general meeting of Centregold, the computer peripherals and software company. Meanwhile, Westbury, the housebuilding company, is holding an extraordinary general meeting to ask shareholders to approve a pounds 32.2m rights issue, intended to help finance the company's acquisition of Clarke Homes, formerly a division of BICC, in early December.

Annual meeting: Centregold.

EGM: Westbury.

Economics

As befits one of the quietest weeks of the year for business and financial news, there are no UK economic statistics scheduled for release. The West German consumer price index for December is expected to edge down to 1.4 per cent from 1.6 per cent in November. Import prices for November are likely to show a further slight fall, bringing the change over the latest 12 months to minus 0.8 per cent - more benefits from that cast-iron currency the Germans are so reluctant to swap for Euros.

Across the Rhine, the French will publish household consumption figures for November, which are set to show a fall of 0.7 per cent year-on-year, showing how low economic confidence was even before the anti-austerity programme strikes began to disrupt the French economy in the last week of November.

TOMORROW

Companies

The first signs of corporate life since the Christmas holidays comes today, with interims due from BBB Design Group and Stanelco. BBB Design, which operates in design and computer-related services, is planning to move from the unlisted securities market to the main exchange. Stanelco, another tiny company, makes thermal processing equipment. British Building and Engineering, which provides services to the construction industry, unveils its final results today. Last year, it showed losses, in part due to accounting irregularities at a subsidiary.

Finals: British Bdg & Eng.

Interims: BBB Design Group, Stanelco.

Economics

Again, no economic statistics today, in the fallow period between the major seasonal holidays. However, minutes of the monthly meeting between the Chancellor and the Governor of the Bank of England held on 1 November will be published. These should throw light on just how hard the Governor was digging in his heels and whether the Chancellor shared the budget strategy with him before cutting base rates a quarter point two weeks ago.

FRIDAY

Companies

Interims from Union Square, the property company, provide the only regularly scheduled financial news of the day. Following the announced winding up of the unlisted securities market, the group has said it would be seeking a listing on the main exchange - but only after its final figures are published for the year ending March 1996. A handful of small companies - including Associated-Henriques, Black & Edgington, The Brockbank Group, Butte Mining, Conrad and Dominion Energy - hold their annual general meetings, before everyone goes off again on holiday. Dominion said on 7 December that the financial statements for the year would not be sent out 21 days before today's AGM, but would be placed before shareholders at an extraordinary meeting to be held before the end of January 1996.

Interims: Union Square.

Annual meetings: Associated-Henriques, Black & Edgington, The Brockbank Group, Butte Mining, Conrad and Dominion Energy.

Economics

In an otherwise empty statistics schedule, the Government's economic trends for December are released today.

NEXT TUESDAY

Companies

No financial news scheduled, but today is day 39 of the Granada bid for Forte, after which no fresh financial information can be published under Takeover Panel rules.

Economics

Today brings a few interesting statistics, both from the Government and the private sector.

Chief among them are the mortgage lending figures from major British banking groups for the month of November, the provisional M0 narrow money supply figures for December, and the UK official reserves figures, also for December.