A record Black Friday beckons

Hello and welcome to the working week. Or, if you are reading this in the US, welcome to the next three working days, and happy Thanksgiving.

Many of us, of course, are likely to feel connected to America’s long holiday weekend as the phenomenon of Black Friday, traditionally linked to shopping after the Thanksgiving turkey has been gobbled down, has gone global.

Consultancy Bain estimates that from Black Friday to Cyber Monday, US retail sales could reach a record-breaking $75bn. The bean counters at PwC are predicting a record-breaker across the Atlantic with £7.1bn of sales in the UK market. There will no doubt be pictures broadcast of rugby scrum scenes in shopping centres. But experts such as EY and consumer behaviour specialist Circana say the reality is likely to be more online shopping and people waiting for better deals as retailers become more desperate to shift stock.

Beyond shopping, a key event in the UK calendar is Friday’s vote in parliament on the assisted dying bill, proposed as a private members’ bill by Labour MP Kim Leadbeater. Approval of this highly contentious piece of legislation would be a seismic change for the country. If rejected, the debate goes away (for now). For more information, I’d recommend the piece by my colleague Laura Hughes on the myriad logistical and ethical questions this issue raises.

Ireland holds a general election on Friday, which on the surface will change little in that it appears on course for a repeat of the Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil-led coalition. This would be a record fourth term for FG, but the question is will it be bigger than FF and thus will Mr “New Energy” Simon Harris return as taoiseach? And then there is the question of how well the independents will do — an Irish Times survey of voters this month found they were the only ones to have risen above the poll’s margin of error.

Earnings season is coming to a close, but there is a steady flow of other corporate news in the diary.

Monday sees Barclays begin its tribunal appeal against the £50mn fine levied on it by the Financial Conduct Authority over its 2008 fundraising with Qatar.

On Tuesday, the ailing clothing retailer Boohoo plans to issue new ordinary shares on AIM, a move unlikely to change much but perhaps another moment to rattle the cage of shareholder Frasers Group and its forthright boss Mike Ashley. Boohoo’s shares have lost more than 90 per cent of their value since their peak in June 2020, when the retailer was buoyed by a boom in online shopping during the pandemic. It has been downhill almost continually since.

Before the closure of the US markets on Thursday and Friday for Thanksgiving, we will have the minutes of the last Fed rate-setting meeting and revised US third-quarter GDP figures. Fed officials have already cut interest rates twice this year and are debating whether to do so again at their final meeting in December. Chair Jay Powell recently reiterated that the central bank was not in a “hurry” to reduce rates to a level that constrained growth, given the underlying strength of the economy.

The world will not stop turning — or indeed growing — just because America is on holiday. India, France and Canada publish their quarterly GDP estimate on Friday, a day after Germany, which last week downgraded its GDP growth forecast, publishes inflation numbers. More details on these and other corporate and economic items below.

One more thing . . . 

Saturday is St Andrew’s day in Scotland, chosen this year as the date for a public memorial service at St Giles’ Cathedral in Edinburgh for former first minister Alex Salmond, who died of a heart attack last month. Whatever your views of the man, it is hard to deny his immense impact on Scottish politics over the past four decades. It also provides an excuse to read, or re-read, the excellent FT obituary by my colleague Mure Dickie.

Key economic and company reports

Here is a more complete list of what to expect in terms of company reports and economic data this week.

Monday

• Bank of England deputy governor for monetary policy Clare Lombardelli speaks at the third Bank of England Watchers’ Conference

• London tribunal begins hearing the appeal case on behalf of Barclays

• Germany: November ifo business climate survey

• Results: Agilent Technologies Q4, Bath & Body Works Q3, Kingfisher Q3 trading update, Zoom Q3

Tuesday

• Admission and commencement of dealings in Boohoo new ordinary shares on AIM expected

• US: minutes of the Federal Open Market Committee meeting published

• Results: Analog Devices Q4, AO World HY, Autodesk Q3, Best Buy Q3, Compass Group FY, Co-operative Bank Q3, Cranswick HY, CrowdStrike Q3, Dell Technologies Q3, Halfords HY, HP Q4, Manchester United Q1, Renew FY, Topps Tiles FY, Urban Outfitters Q3

Wednesday

• New Zealand: interest rate decision

• US: revised Q3 GDP figures, plus October durable goods orders

• Results: easyJet FY, Johnson Matthey HY, Nationwide Building Society HY, Pets at Home HY

Thursday

• EU: European Central Bank General Council meeting

• Germany: preliminary November consumer price index (CPI) and harmonised index of consumer prices (HICP) inflation rate data

• South Korea: interest rate decision

• US: Thanksgiving Day. Markets closed

• Results: Dr Martens HY, Energean trading and operations update, James Latham HY, Tullow Oil trading statement and operational update

Friday

• Canada: Q3 GDP estimate

• EU: ECB November Consumer Expectations Survey

• France: November CPI and HICP inflation rate data, plus final Q3 GDP estimate

• Germany: November unemployment rate

• India: Q2 GDP figures

• UK: Bank of England Financial Stability Report

• US: financial markets close early after Thanksgiving

World events

Finally, here is a rundown of other events and milestones this week.

Monday

• Netherlands: 29th Conference of States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention, seeking cuts to such munitions, begins in The Hague and continues until Friday

• UK: CBI annual conference is held in London

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

• US: 98th Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York, noted for the giant inflatable balloons and marching bands, walking through Manhattan

Friday

• Black Friday, the traditional beginning of the Christmas shopping season in the US, the day after Thanksgiving, but now adopted by retailers around the world as an excuse to launch sales on their products

• Italy: members of the CGIL and UIL unions plan to stage an eight-hour general strike in protest at the Meloni government’s budget plans

• Ireland: parliamentary elections

• UK: the private members’ bill on assisted dying in England and Wales proposed by Labour MP Kim Leadbeater gets its second reading in parliament

Saturday

• 150th anniversary of the birth of former British prime minister Winston Churchill at Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire

• Iceland: parliamentary elections

• UK: public memorial service for former first minister Alex Salmond. First minister John Swinney is due to attend, alongside representatives of other political parties in Scotland

Sunday

• First day of Advent and the first day of meteorological winter in the northern hemisphere

• 25th anniversary of scientists in the Human Genome Project announcing the complete sequencing of the DNA making up human chromosome 22 — the first human chromosome completely sequenced

• Austria: Opec and non-Opec ministerial meeting in Vienna, including Opec’s 13 member countries and non-Opec countries such as Russia, with discussions expected about market conditions and further production adjustments

• Romania: parliamentary elections

• South Africa takes over one-year presidency of the G20