Last-minute: 15 million people are expected to hit the shops tomorrow in a bid to pick up Christmas bargainsA staggering 15 million people are expected to hit the shops today for last-minute gift buying on 'Panic Saturday'.
It is predicted to be the busiest retail day of the year, with High Street takings set to top £2billion.
Sales figures suggest that millions have delayed their Christmas shopping until the last minute in the hope of picking up a bargain, and stores are now promoting significant price cuts on a wide range of gift items.
Shopping malls and stores will extend their trading hours in the coming days, with some staying open until midnight.
Many will push Sunday trading restrictions to breaking point tomorrow by introducing a 'browsing time' of up to one hour to extend the normal six hours of opening
From Monday, more than 800 supermarkets and smaller food stores will be trading 24 hours a day through to Christmas Eve.
The director of the Centre for Retail Research, Professor Joshua Bamfield, said: 'When money is tight, there is a tendency to push back Christmas shopping until the last minute.
'There will be a big surge from now on. You could call it a planned panic.
'Many people will now be off work through to Christmas and so they are free to do the shopping that they have put off until now.'
Christmas and the January sales are critically important for retailers, accounting for a quarter of their entire annual takings and profits. For some, the figure is as high as 60 per cent.The Saturday before Christmas is normally the busiest of the year.
Last year, poor trading over the festive season led to 20 major retailers going into administration, the loss of 40,000 jobs, and the proportion of shops that are empty rising to 10 per cent.
Any failure to hit sales targets today will be the deciding factor on whether full-blown January sales will be brought forward.
Discount frenzy: High Street stores are slashing 50 per cent off prices to entice recession-hit shoppersBut a discounting frenzy has already begun on high streets as retailers look to entice recession-hit shoppers into spending their money.
Many of the popular chains have slashed 50 per cent or more off prices.
At Currys Digital, a Kodak wireless digital photoframe which was £99.99 has been reduced to £59.99, and a Tom Tom satnav has been slashed from £279.99 to £129.99.
At Marks and Spencer all hampers have 50 per cent off. Boots is running a fragrance promotion and has discounted a range of aftershaves or perfumes.
The clothing store Coast has discounted some dresses by £100 and evening wear in Oasis is marked down by 50 per cent.
However, the scale and size of reductions is expected to rise sharply over the next six days.
Professor Bamfield said: 'There has been something of a stand-off between shoppers and retailers. It is a question of who blinks first.
'I would say we will be seeing some significant price cuts over the next few days.'
The professor says that many shoppers have shifted their spending this year to the internet.
'We forecast that online spending will reach £8.9billion this Christmas, representing £1 in every £5 that is spent,' he said.
'This year shoppers said that 72 per cent intended to use online retailers to buy goods at this Christmas and 38 per cent would buy most of their Christmas goods online.'The number of shops planning to open round the clock is a record.
Among the supermarkets, Tesco will have 495 large stores trading 24 hours a day from Monday morning, while Asda will have 223 and another 100 open until midnight.
Sainsbury's will have 24 stores trading 24 hours a day, plus 221 open until midnight.
Morrisons opens its stores until 10pm.
Marks & Spencer will be opening 28 of its larger stores until midnight next week, while 113 of its Simply Food outlets will trade round the clock.
Debenhams will open 100 of its 156 department stores until 11pm. Other retailers will be also be trading late into the night.
Official retail sales figures published earlier this week revealed a fall in the value and volume of sales in November compared with October, the first monthly fall in six months.
City analysts believe this is indicative of a shift to last-minute panic buying.
The director general of the British Retail Consortium, Stephen Robertson, said: 'As many people start their holidays, we're expecting bumper trading - retail sales for the day should top £2billion.
'In recent years people have increasingly left their Christmas shopping to the last minute.
'This is a risky strategy if you want to be sure must-have presents aren't sold out, but it is likely to mean there is plenty of shopping still to be done.
'Let's hope snow doesn't stop people getting to stores.'
source: dailymail