Some of the biggest names on the London market will report next week.

Barclays will start the banks' reporting season on Thursday with full-year results likely to set a downbeat tone. NatWest Stockbrokers is predicting pre-tax profits of £3.60bn, a slight decrease on last year's £3.65bn figure.

Analysts are also concerned the bank is conceding ground on the high street to more competitive rivals such as HBOS and Northern Rock.

Lloyds TSB has already warned that full-year results on Friday will be gloomy, with higher bad debt provisions and £200m set aside to cover mis-sold endowment mortgages and pensions, including at life insurer Abbey Life.

Fund manager Gerrard expects pre-tax profits of £4.12bn, compared with £4.29bn a year earlier, and said there was a likelihood that Lloyds TSB could also consider a cut in its annual dividend.

Telecoms group BT will be under pressure on Thursday to show it can get somewhere near the targets set in April of six per cent to eight per cent revenues growth over the following three years.

In BT's November update, revenues were up two per cent in the six months to September 30. The market is likely to be looking for third quarter pre-tax profits of £423m, up from £381m last time, as well as an encouraging update on the take-up of BT's much-heralded broadband offering.

Pharmaceuticals group GlaxoSmithKline's fourth quarter is expected to have been its toughest of the year after suffering from the impact of the weak US dollar and the launch of competition to its antibiotic Augmentin.

Despite this, like-for-like sales growth of five per cent should be reported on Wednesday and fund manager Gerrard is forecasting annual pre-tax profits to increase to £6.77bn from the £6.17bn seen a year earlier.

NatWest Stockbrokers expects oil group BP to reveal that pre-tax profits have fallen by about 25 per cent on Tuesday, down to $8.5bn (£5.2bn) from $11.5bn (£7bn) in the same period last year