Solid roots have let Kingfisher take a brush cutter to hedge funds' pessimistic outlook

The UK and France, according to the popular script, are living beyond their means and their citizens must brace for tax rises, spending cuts and all manner of confidence-sapping measures.

- Nils Pratley

So it ought to be a horrible time to be a retailer whose biggest market is the UK and whose second largest is France. Throw in a product range that is heavy on kitchens and bathrooms, where a purchase can usually be deferred until next year, and you've got a recipe for weak trading, right?

Such thinking was presumably why Kingfisher - the owner of B&Q and Screwfix in the UK and Castorama and Brico Dépôt in France - was among the most heavily shorted stocks in the FTSE 100 index by hedge funds going into yesterday's half-year numbers. If you want to bet against an economy, or two at once, a large and widely owned DIY retailer is a logical place to start in theory.