Despite the bad news generated by the market around these three companies, all of Morrison's, Sainsbury and Tesco's are good companies that are down more due to market sentiment regarding their sector than any real disaster in terms of the fundamentals of each.
Take Sainsbury as an example. In the last 4-5 years the share price has halved despite the fact that the company has put up good results every year in a challenging austerity consumer market. Morrison the same, although their share price, until hit by the "Tesco effect" from January, had held up quite well. Tesco is the drag on the sector, because of its lagging UK performance, however, it also continues to increase its profits if you look at the bigger picture of its international exposure. For those that think that Tesco is suffering purely because of its UK woes you really need to think again and consider that Sainsbury, a UK based operation, has actually suffered a worse share price performance despite outperforming Tesco in the UK over the last 3 years!
It really is all about sentiment. The UK retailing sector is in the doghouse with the market and until that changes its difficult to see an upside for these companies. I would suggest monitoring the long term monthly and weekly charts and look for indicator (macD/RSI, etc)/MA crossovers on these for a sentiment change before buying. They are cheap and unloved at the moment, but could still get cheaper.
