Tuesday preview: Whitbread first-quarter to provide structural answers

With not much in the way of macro data to grease the wheels of the market, Brexit chat is likely to continue dominating the market commentary on Tuesday, with Whitbread's first quarter results the biggest scheduled report.

For the macroeconomic data, the German ZEW survey for June is expected to show last month's 6.4 reading for economic sentiment move to 5.0, according to the consensus estimate, while the current situation reading falls to 53.0 from 53.1.

UK public sector net borrowing data for May is predicted to expand to £9.5bn from £6.58bn last time.

Company watchers will be more focused on Whitbread. The FTSE 100 owner of Costa coffee shops, Premier Inn hotels and a number of pub restaurants will provide an update on sales and its store rollout in the three months to the start of June.

Year on year comparisons will be affected by the earlier timing of Easter this year.

In its preview, Deutsche Bank felt the key question is whether the like-for-like (LFL) weakness in the fourth quarter for both Costa and Premier Inn "was a temporary dip due to weather and the knock on impact of the Paris attacks, or whether there are more structural trading issues".

Deutsche forecasts the quarter will see Premier Inn LFL revenue per available room (revpar) might be weak due to its hotel extensions and in London, while also being hit by Easter, though strong market data for the regions should be positive for the brand.

Sector data is mildly encouraging for the restaurants business. The Coffer Peach Business Tracker showed sales, increasing in March but dropping in April, with solid performance in restaurants.

For Costa, management said at the time of the prelims that "indications are that Costa UK has had a good start to the year", with full year guidance for a 2-3% LFL growth. Deutsche see LFL sales for Costa up 1.5% this quarter given footfall weakness and the strong comparative last year.

For comparison, UBS forecasts RevPAR growth of -1%, Costa LFL growth of 2.5%, and pub restaurants LFL growth of 0%.

Tuesday 21 June

INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC ANNOUNCEMENTS
ZEW Survey (EU) (10:00)
ZEW Survey (GER) (10:00)

UK ECONOMIC ANNOUNCEMENTS
Public Sector Net Borrowing (09:30)

FINALS
Photo-Me International

TRADING STATEMENTS
Petrofac, Whitbread

ANNUAL REPORT
SSE

EGMS
JPMorgan Senior Secured Loan Fund Limited

AGMS
BlackRock Emerging Europe, Coca-Cola HBC AG (CDI), Futura Medical, Global Resources Investment Trust , Saga , Strategic Minerals, Whitbread

FINAL DIVIDEND PAYMENT DATE
Capital & Counties Properties , M. P. Evans Group, Powerflute Oyj (DI)

INTERIM DIVIDEND PAYMENT DATE
Utilitywise plc