The winners and losers of Christmas trading will be revealed when supermarkets report on their festive performance.
Morrisons is seen as likely to report sales down by around 2% today.
Broker Jefferies is even more pessimistic, believing same-store sales fell by as much as 2.8%.
Sainsbury’s follows on Wednesday with the consensus across the City expecting growth may have eased back to 0.9% in a sign that Tesco’s fight-back is paying off.
Tesco, which reports on Thursday, is likely to have pulled out all the stops.
Deutsche Bank predicts sales up 0.8% in the six weeks to January 5 thanks to a strong promotional package and improved grocery offer.
Panmure Gordon retail analysts believe Tesco notched up the strongest sales of the “big four” and are pencilling in a 1% gain.
They add that the rise sets up a year of “significant strategic change” for the group.
Marks & Spencer will reveal on Thursday whether its Christmas advertising push won over shoppers after the retailer ditched its usual roster of celebrities for a music-inspired campaign.
Most analysts believe general merchandise sales declines will have improved marginally over the third quarter, down 1.5% on a like-for-like basis.
However, food sales growth is expected to have slipped to 0.5% in a sign of the intense market conditions.
Panmure Gordon experts said that while M&S still had “bags of potential”, they remained cautious on the group after it warned of volatile trading at the half-year results and amid signs of heavy discounting to shift stock.
A recent advertising blitz is expected to have helped Domino’s Pizza in its crucial fourth quarter after a recent slowdown in sales growth.
The fast-food delivery group, which updates on full-year trading tomorrow, recently worried the market when third-quarter sales showed sales growth slipping compared with the first half.
Most analysts are expecting pre-tax profits to rise to £46.3 million over the year to December 30, up from £43.6m the previous year.
Debenhams shares may have doubled in the last year following better-than-expected trading, but this has failed to stop analysts worrying that sales before Christmas were too dependent on promotions.
Panmure Gordon stockbrokers said figures tomorrow are expected to show a 1.5% rise in like-for-like sales, offset by uncertainty over margins after reported discounts of up to 50% in the peak trading week before Christmas.