By Taiga Uranaka

TOKYO, April 8 (Reuters) - Seven & I Holdings (3382.T) on Thursday 8 April forecast 6 percent growth in operating profit for the year started in March as Japan's largest retailer slashes costs and hopes for a recovery in consumer spending.

Photo: www.7andi.com

The firm is among the first major retailers to report annual results for a year marked by sliding sales and a fierce price war.

Market participants are closely watching for signs that Seven & I and its rivals are over the worst of the retail slump and that a recent export-led economic recovery in Japan will eventually trickle down to most consumers.

Seven & I, which runs over 12,000 Seven-Eleven convenience stores in Japan and thousands more overseas, said operating profit fell 20 percent to 226.7 billion yen ($2.4 billion) for the year just ended in February.

Early last month, the firm flagged that it would likely report weaker earnings than it had previously estimated, saying cost-cutting efforts had failed to offset sales falls.

Seven & I suffered as thrifty consumers shied away from designer clothes at department stores, hunted for bargains at supermarkets and were less inclined to make impulse purchases at convenience stores.

The company forecast an operating profit of 240 billion yen for the year just began, slightly below a mean estimate of 246.1 billion yen in a poll of 15 analysts by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Before the results, shares of Seven & I closed down 1.7 percent at 2,314 yen. The stock is up 2 percent over the past year, underperforming a 30 percent rise in the benchmark Nikkei average .N225. (Reporting by Taiga Uranaka; Editing by Valerie Lee)