Trading Thoughts Sunday 10th August   (Crocodile)

A quiet week expected with the highlight being BSKYB finals.

TuesdayBSKYB profits are forecast to have risen from 273m to 439m. Subscriber numbers are expected to have risen to more than 6.8m by the end of June, putting it within touching distance of its target of seven million by the end of 2003. But future subscriber forecast numbers should set the direction of the share price on the morning.NTL will hope to use second quarter results on to show it is heading in the right direction after completing a complex financial restructuring in thh US after emerging from bankruptcy protection. No recent analysts' forecasts have been published for the New York-listed group, which has around 2.7m domestic customers, including more than 650,000 internet broadband users. CD Bramall motor retailer should reap the benefit of stronger-than-expected demand for new car registrations. Higher pre-tax profits of 15.5m are expected on the annual turnover which should be in excess of 1.5 billion.WednesdayP&O is not expected to offer many surprises but should show strong growth in container volume, but a weaker showing from its ferries arm with lower volumes in the tourist market. City analysts are forecasting full-year pre-tax profits of around 117m.

Balfour Beatty posted a 16% rise in underlying profits last year after it benefited from a number of large scale projects. The company should report further growth this week, with underlying profits up to around 43m from 40m a year earlier. Recent contracts secured have included construction of a proposed 87m railway station at Heathrow Terminal 5. Balfour also has a strong roads division, which secured 175m of additional work from the Highways Agency last year. ThursdayCountrywide Assured the UK's largest estate agency group reports first half results has made no secret of the fact that the effects of uncertainty in the run-up to the Iraq war and deterioration in its life assurance arm Based on comments from the company, the market is expecting house sales volumes to be as much as 30% lower than last year and profits forecasts to just 20m, compared with last year's 35.8m

Last week the FTSE closed just above the expected 4060 /4130 trading range.

Enjoying the sunshine here in France so juts a quick look at this weeks chart. The 6 month uptrend has now firmly dropped through support and remained in the sideways 4000/4200 channel. Overall the longer term 3 year downtrend channel should be the dominant one  although the FTSE is challenging the resistance line.

Looking towards next week my guess is for the FTSE to continue trading sideways with a small fall back as it is towards the top of the range. At the present there are few reports forecast which should challenge the Bull / Bear Stalemate.

Wishing you all the best for the week ahead and as ever looking forward to your thoughts!

David

David@FTSEDOW.COM  www.FTSEDOW.com    All the above comments are purely a personal opinion and no investment advice is intended.  Please do your own research.

All  Times GMT

United Kingdom

F)inals (I)nterim

United States

(Click Flag)

Europe & World

Mon 11th August

Reporting

Company Updates

Financial Data

BAA July Traffic Figures Morgan Sindall (I) PBT 1.5m exp. Management Consulting (I), Workspace Group (Q1)

00.01 July BRC Retail Sales Monitor Europe: SAS AB (Q2) 09.30 July PPI Input m/m 0.7% exp. 09.30 July PPI Output m/m 0.1% exp. 09.30 June Non-EU Trade Balance -1.85bn exp.

Tue 12th

British Sky Broadcasting (F) EBITDA 439m exp. Also Reporting: CD Bramall (I), Randgold Resources (Q2),

ROK Property Solutions (I)

00.01 Business Confidence Monitor 09.30 July RPI-X y/y 2.7% exp.

JC Penney (Q2)

19.15 FOMC Interest Rate Announcement

Wed 13th

Ex Dividend

Balfour Beatty (I) PBT 128.5m exp. BPP Holdings (I), Torex (I)

09.30 July Unemployment +5k exp. Europe: MAN AG (Q2) 09.30 June Average Earnings 3m y/y 3.3% exp. 10.30 Bank of England Quarterly Inflation Report

NTL (Q2), Tiffany & Co (Q2), Wal-Mart (Q2)

13.30 July Import Price Index m/m 0.2% exp. 13.30 July Advance Retail Sales 0.9% exp. 15.00 Business Inventories June 0.1%

Ex dividends in pence: Alliance Unichem (5.7), Amvescap (5), BP (4.039), Barclays (7.05), DS Smith (6), DTZ Holdings (4), Diagonal (0.7),Filtronic (1.8),

Foreign & Colonial (1.8), GKN (3.8), HBOS (10.3), Inchcape (12), Jersey Electric Company (32.8), Lloyds TSB (10.7), Quintain Estates (5.25), Reed Elsevier (3.3),

Rio Tinto (18.45), Rotork (5.25), Royal Bank of Scotland (14.6), St Modwen Properties (2.2), Scottish & Newcastle (20), Shell (6.1), Smith & Nephew (1.85),

Standard Chartered (US$0.155), United Business Media (3.3)

Thu 14th

Countrywide Assured (I) PBT 55.1m exp. P&O Q2 Trading Update Pendragon (I), Wireless Group (I)

00.01 Q2 House Building

Dell (Q2). Estee Lauder(Q2)

13.30 July PPI m/m 0.1% exp. 13.30 Initial Jobless Claims (w/e 09/08)394k exp. 13.30 June Trade Balance -$41.5bn exp. 19.00 Minutes of June 25th FOMC Meeting

Allianz (Q2), E.ON AG (Q2)

Thyssen Krupp (Q3)

07.00 German Q2 Preliminary GDP q/q 0.1% 11.00 Q2 GDP Estimate q/q flat exp. 11.00 EC 3rd & 4th Quarter GDP Forecasts

Fri 15th