STOCKS TO WATCH: Go-Ahead pins faith in ‘pent-up demand’

Shares in bus and rail operator Go-Ahead have halved over the past year, with rail travel currently at just 15 per cent of pre-pandemic levels. 

But there are some cheerier prospects: the group this year intends to hire 1,100 apprentices – from drivers to engineers – with two thirds of them deployed on London buses. 

Empty: Go-Ahead is struggling with rail travel currently at just 15 per cent of pre-pandemic levels

Go-Ahead is ramping up its hiring programme in an attempt to improve diversity in the male-dominated industry and replace retiring workers. 

The move is also a vote of confidence in life returning to moribund town centres. 

Katy Taylor, director of strategy at Go-Ahead, says there is ‘massive pent-up demand’ for leisure travel and that the company believes commuting will return, simply with fewer crowds on peak-time services. Is a rail revival really possible?

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Here’s a sobering thought. Last year’s Valentine’s Day was the last major consumer event uninterrupted by Covid. 

Next month’s celebration on the 14th promises to be radically different. 

High street retailers such as chocolatier Hotel Chocolat will be relying on online sales – with many expected to do even better than last year. 

Shopper research group Savvy estimates Valentine’s retail sales will be up 2 per cent on last year at around £870million. 

Meanwhile, listed hospitality firms such as The Restaurant Group and Cineworld will be missing out completely. 

Savvy says romantic couples plan to spend big on home cooking. Another Covid win for the supermarkets. 

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Oil majors BP and Shell will this week post fourth-quarter numbers after a year in which they slashed jobs and dividends since the pandemic punctured fuel demand. 

BP’s Instagram junkie boss Bernard Looney is attempting to cut its debt mountain and simultaneously investing in green energy. 

Both BP and Shell are likely to provide an improving picture as oil prices claw their way back, but how long will that last with climate policies tightening across the globe?

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Look out for a quarterly update from GlaxoSmithKline this week. 

Left somewhat in the shade by rivals’ Covid vaccine efforts, GSK’s tie-ups with overseas partners to produce a jab are still in the trial stages.

Investors will be keen for an update from chief executive Emma Walmsley on those projects and potential Covid treatments, as well as her break-up of its pharma and consumer goods divisions. 

Meanwhile, amid vaccine bickering, former GSK chairman Sir Philip Hampton points out it’s difficult for producers to ramp up from zero to mass production faultlessly. 

He tells me: ‘You can deliver a car with the wrong colour paint if you really have to…but you can’t get vaccines wrong.’   

This post first appeared on Dailymail.co.uk