The UK’s half-year bank reporting season kicks off this week, with Barclays, Lloyds Banking Group and Royal Bank of Scotland due to issue results, while other leading companies in the spotlight will include British Gas owner Centrica and broadcaser ITV.

Dominated by fears over weak bank balance sheets, the banking sector has rarely been out of the spotlight in the first six months of the year.

The Financial Policy Committee’s discovery of a £27.1billion hole in bank finances and, even after action to bolster their reserves, five of the major players – Barclays, Lloyds, RBS, Nationwide building society and the Co-operative Bank – were that told they still needed to find another £13.4bn to plug the shortfall.

However, there has been a marked improvement in trading performance among the major players in recent months thanks to ultra-low interest rates and lower bad debts.

Analysts at Citi predicts underlying second quarter profits of £2bn for Barclays on Tuesday, helping interim profits surge to £3.57bn, excluding restructuring costs, from £871m a year earlier.

On Thursday, Citi expects Lloyds to double interim underlying pre-tax profits to £2.2bn, while on a statutory basis it is also predicted to claw its way back out of the red, with profits of £3.3bn.

Better retail revenues and lower loan losses at its troubled Ulster Bank arm are expected to drive further progress at RBS on Friday, with Citi experts pencilling in £917m in pre-tax profits for the three months to the end of June, against losses of £168m a year earlier.

British Gas parent Centrica is likely to generate further anger over its profits when it announces half-year results on Wednesday.

The energy giant cashed in on the cold spell over the winter with residential gas consumption up 18% over the first four months of 2013, just after raising prices by 6% in December.

In a trading update in May, it admitted that it had made so much money from hard-pressed householders during the freeze that it was putting a lid on more prices rises for the time being. But consumer groups said the company must go further and reduce prices for households.

Forecast pre-tax profits of £350m for the first half of this year from the company’s British Gas Residential arm would represent a 1.4% rise from £345m for the same period last year, with gains from heavy winter gas usage expected to be partially offset by the cost of a new obligation to deliver energy efficiency measures in customers’ homes, according to analysts at Deutsche Bank.

On Tuesday, broadcaster ITV will justify big spending on original TV content as growing earnings from its studios business offsets tough advertising markets.

The group has been snapping up production companies behind programmes such as 24 Hours In A&E and the Graham Norton Show to build an arsenal of original content it can sell around the globe.

This has helped revive its studios business, fuelling the group’s progress despite sluggish advertising markets.

However, analysts at brokerage Credit Suisse said the recovering UK economy could boost advertising spending, adding that an escalating marketing battle between telecoms giants BT and British Sky Broadcasting could also help sales during the traditionally quiet summer months. Credit Suisse sees ITV growing first-half adjusted profits to £264m from £228m a year earlier.