The company's sales were affected by deflation in food prices, lower disposable income for consumers and higher consumer debt levels because of previous purchases of durable goods on credit.

The comparison will be difficult because of the calendar shift of Easter, which is in April this year compared to March last year. That will have a big impact on the March numbers. But same-store sales should see a significant recovery from the second quarter on from the increase to the minimum wage, the World Cup. There will be many drivers.

Many initiatives to reduce expenses have been implemented, and we started to see some progress in the fourth quarter. But we see the company with many opportunities to increase efficiencies and reduce expenses.

There were some drivers for increasing margins in 2005, including better negotiations with suppliers and higher pricing points in stores. The company made several deep changes in terms of the way we negotiate with suppliers, as well as how pricing in stores, present products...category management issues.

As a general rule, as income rises, so debt increases, but in the very low income groups we find an extraordinarily high ratio of debt.

So far, the debt payment ratio (of loan payments to income) hasn't been higher this decade than during the 1990s, but it's been partly held in check by lower interest rates. In some sense, we haven't seen the whole burden bearing down yet.