Europe's new results season kicks off in earnest next week, offering investors their first chance to sift through top scorecards for evidence of any sales recovery or fallout from record high oil prices.
Handset giant Nokia, Philips Electronics, and retailers such as Carrefour and Hennes & Mauritz update the market.
As European shares trade around five-month highs despite strong crude oil prices, analysts said stocks may come under pressure as some earnings disappointments are inevitable.
"We are going to see some slight disappointment as most of these are global type companies," said Walter Kemmsies, European equity strategist at investment bank J.P. Morgan & Co.
US companies, such as chip leader Intel which also reports next week, have warned ahead of their results.
"There is a very straight read-through from US trends to Europe. The ratio of negative to positive earnings statements has picked up in the United States and we expect the same in Europe," Kemmsies said.
"If we just barely beat expectations, that would be a good thing, but the chance is that the overall season may come in at slightly below consensus in Europe," he added.
Companies will be tempted to promise more share buybacks and bigger dividends to keep shareholders sweet as stock markets still face headwinds like high oil prices, Kemmsies said.
Earnings from top US groups, such as financials Merrill Lynch and Citigroup, tech firms Yahoo, Apple and Sun Microsystems, and auto giant General Motors may influence shares in European peers.
A confident outlook from General Electric lifted European stocks on Friday.
Nokia, the world's largest mobile phone maker, is expected to report falling third-quarter earnings in line with its guidance in September.
Richard Windsor, who tracks Nokia at Nomura bank, said investors will want to know what suddenly changed in the third quarter to trigger new guidance.
"The market will want to know why are they spending less on marketing and what is the outlook for the fourth quarter," Windsor said.
As investors hope for a more bullish tone from Nokia on Thursday, elsewhere in the technology sector, Philips reports on Tuesday, with Dutch chip equipment-making group ASML a day later.
Crashing prices in thin display screens and slower consumer spending on electronic goods are expected to hold back third-quarter sales at Philips, analysts said.
Reports from several high-profile retailers may provide a litmus test of consumer staying power amid concerns that the French and Germans are still not helping their economies grow faster by spending more.
"We want to see how the consumer has done. We are all looking for revenue growth to start driving things from here," Kemmsies said.
In past earnings seasons, bottom lines have been swelled by cost cuts rather than growing revenues.
Carrefour, the world's second-largest retailer, is expected to post higher third-quarter sales on Tuesday.
On the same day, UK food and clothing retailer Marks & Spencer gives a business update with investors hoping it will snap a four-quarter run of falling sales. Swedish fashion retailer Hennes & Mauritz will report September sales on Friday. Elsewhere, UK sports retailer JJB Sports updates on its first-half on Wednesday, as will UK retailer GUS and French cosmetics firm Clarins on Thursday.
Other consumer - and crude oil - sensitive groups in the limelight next week include traffic figures on Monday from airlines Lufthansa and Swiss. UK insurance group Legal & General, French food group Danone, and Swiss drug firm Roche all give sales updates on Thursday.
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