Appears to be blowing across the UK consumer. I subscribe to various retail clipping services as this is my specialist area and things are not looking good.

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Directors of listed retail groups sold 44m worth of their own companies' shares in the three months to the end of April. The high figure, almost seven times the 6.5m worth of shares sold by senior executives at listed retailers in the final three months of last year, suggests that even the executives charged with running the UK's retail chains have lost faith in spending on the high street.

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City traders have bet more than 300m that Next's share price will fall this week after it releases news on its recent trading. The retailer is one of several chains due to update investors this week as fears grow that the high street is slipping into recession. Traders have short sold more than 22m shares in Next that they do not own, speculating they will be able to buy back the shares at a lower price after Nexts trading update.

More stories at:-

http://www.theretailbulletin.com/index.php?page=5&u=19970&id=6550

Scrip

i tend to agree with sentiment, there has been lots of small pieces of evidence recently with consumer sentiment falling.

Read the same article on next over the weekend, surprised to see the price back up to 1500p this morning - tempted to short into results as 1500p may well form a resistance point