Berkeley Eng Share News (BKY)

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following is a summary of top news stories Tuesday.
----------
COMPANIES
----------
British supermarket chain J Sainsbury PLC reported its first sales fall in nine years for the fourth quarter of its financial year, but Chief Executive Justin King said the grocer will not get caught up in the price war within the supermarket sector at the moment, and will ensure competitive prices in its own way. The UK's third largest grocer reported a 1.5% drop in sales in the fourth quarter, and a steep decline of 3.8% in like-for-likes sales. The downbeat fourth-quarter trading update was in stark contrast to stable sales growth in previous quarters, and a strong Christmas trading period. The grocer said it expects the outlook for customers to continue to be challenging for the coming year, but in the long term is confident it can outperform its competitors.
----------
Online fashion retailer ASOS PLC said strong sales growth continued over the past few months, pushing total retail sales up 34% in the first half of the year, and said it is still confident in achieving GBP1 billion in sales this year, but warned that an increase in investment will cut into its profit margin. The online clothing and beauty retailer said sales from outside the UK continue to increase, now representing 65% of total sales. However the retailer warned that it will now spend more on investment this year than originally expected, on warehousing in the UK and Germany, as well as on starting up distribution in China, which will hit its earnings before interest and tax margin.
----------
Mining company Antofagasta PLC reported a sharp drop in net profit for 2013 as the fall in commodity prices combined with higher costs, particularly for energy, to more than offset higher copper production. The Chile-based company reported a net profit of USD659.6 million, or 66.9 cents a share, for 2013, down from USD1.04 billion, or 105.2 cents a share, in 2012. Revenues fell to USD5.97 billion, from USD6.74 billion. Its copper production rose 1.6% to 721,200 tonnes, mainly thanks to higher plant throughput at its Esperanza site, but the average London Metal Exchange copper price fell 7.9% while the company's own realised copper prices fell 10.6% during the year. Its cash costs also rose 9.8%, mainly thanks to higher energy costs at its Los Pelambres site.
----------
Resolution Ltd, which operates the Friends Life brand, declared its three-year restructuring complete and said it will change its name to Friends Life Group Ltd, as its annual pretax profit from continuing operation increased by more than five times. Resolution also said it has entered a new strategic partnership with Schroders PLC, which will now manage GBP12.2 billion of equity and multi-asset funds on behalf of Resolution customers. The funds were previously managed by F&C Asset Management PLC, which has faced pressure on such strategic partner revenue of late. Resolution Ltd reported a GBP369.0 million pretax profit from continuing operations in 2013, compared with GBP66.0 million in 2012. Revenue declined by 1.0% to GBP10.99 billion as claims, benefits and expenses fell by 3.5% to GBP10.64 billion.
----------
Simon Nixon, founder and non-executive deputy chairman of MoneySupermarket.com Group PLC, sold 15.0 million more shares than originally planned in an overnight placing, bookrunners Citigroup Global Markets Ltd and Credit Suisse Securities (Europe) Ltd said. Nixon had originally intended to sell 55.0 million shares but increased that figure to 70.0 million due to strong investor demand.
----------
IG Group Holdings PLC reported a 9.1% increase in third-quarter net trading revenue, driven by its European and UK operations, while also expecting lower full-year costs than previously expected. The spread betting firm reported GBP96.7 million in net trading revenue for the three months ended February 28, compared with GBP88.6 million for the corresponding period a year earlier. It said it is on track to deliver net trading revenue revenue for all of 2014 ahead of the prior year and in line with expectations.
----------
Xaar PLC doubled its full-year dividend as it saw pretax profit jump in 2013, boosted by strong growth in its digital printing products for ceramic tiles, particularly in China. The company also announced the departure of Chief Executive Ian Dinwoodie in 2015. The digital inkjet printing technology company declared a dividend of 8.0 pence for 2013, doubled from 4.0 pence in the previous year.
----------
Oil and gas exploration company Cairn Energy PLC said it swung to a loss in 2013 as it booked a big impairment for the Catcher fields in the North Sea, and it warned that its outlook depends heavily on its exploration programme this year and the timing of the resolution of its tax dispute in India. Cairn in January said that it had become the latest international company to be contacted by Indian tax authorities, which wanted to discuss its income tax assessments for its financial year to end-March 2007. It has pledged to defend itself, saying the claim was the result of a law brought in after the year affected by the claim.
----------
Housebuilding company Berkeley Group Holdings PLC said sales of new-build properties across all of its brands have been strong since November. The FTSE 250 company is made up of four autonomous companies: St George, St James, Berkeley and St Edward. Berkeley said the UK government's Help to Buy Scheme has increased activity in the property market and so has helped the acceleration of delivery of new homes across the sector. Its comments come just after the Chancellor George Osborne said the first phase of the government's flagship mortgage-financing scheme will be extended by four years to 2020.
----------
MARKETS
----------
UK stock indices are lower, with AIM underperforming after ASOS reduced its full-year profit expectations.
----------
FTSE 100: down 0.1% at 6560.84
FTSE 250: down 0.4% at 16237.59
AIM ALL-SHARE: down 0.9% at 862.89
----------
The euro is down against the dollar following a drop in the eurozone sentiment index
----------
GBP-USD: down at USD1.6607
EUR-USD: down at USD1.3907

GOLD: down at USD1361.85 per ounce
OIL (Brent): up at USD106.37 a barrel

(changes since end of previous GMT day)
----------
ECONOMICS AND GENERAL
----------
The Bank of England said the UK government has appointed three new senior policy members, including promoting Monetary Policy Committee member Ben Broadbent to the position of deputy governor. Anthony Habgood, who has been chairman of Whitbread PLC since 2005 and chairman of Reed Elsevier PLC and NV since 2009, has been appointed as the Chairman of the Court for a renewable period of four years. Broadbent will be deputy governor for monetary policy. Nemat Shafik, who will start her role from the start of August, will fill the newly created role of deputy governor, responsible for markets and banking. Shafik will hold seats on the MPC, the Financial Policy Committee, and the Court of Directors.
----------
Eurozone's merchandise trade with the rest of the world resulted in a surplus in January, marking an improvement from the deficit recorded a year earlier, preliminary data published by statistical office Eurostat showed. The balance of January's foreign trade, on an unadjusted basis, was a surplus of EUR0.9 billion, compared to a deficit of EUR5.4 billion in the corresponding month of last year. Economists were looking for a surplus of EUR13.9 billion for January. In December 2013, the bloc recorded a trade surplus of EUR13.8 billion.
----------
Economic expectations for Germany worsened in March burdened by Crimea crisis, survey data from the Centre for European Economic Research/ZEW revealed. The economic confidence index dropped more-than-expected to 46.6 in March from 55.7 in February. The score was forecast to fall to 52.
----------
New car sales in Europe increased in February for the sixth month in a row, according to figures released. Registrations in the EU increased by 8% year-on-year to 861,058, the Brussels-based European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) said. Sales remained weak as the industry recovers from a sharp downturn. The monthly total was the second lowest result for the month of February in the past 10 years.
----------
Germany's top court has dismissed lawsuits that challenged the legality of the eurozone's permanent bailout scheme, the European Stability Mechanism. Some of the lawsuits are inadmissible and the others are baseless, Andreas Vosskuhle, head of the Karlsruhe-based Constitutional Court said as the court announced its ruling.
----------
President Vladimir Putin took legal steps to swiftly let Crimea join Russia, hours before he was to address lawmakers and governors about his plans for the Ukrainian region. In an instruction published on the state legal website pravo.gov.ru Putin approved the drafting of a bilateral treaty with Crimea about the peninsula's joining the Russian Federation. The Kremlin said Putin has officially informed the Russian government and both houses of parliament of the Crimean leadership's request to accede Russia. He is expected to address an assembly of the upper and lower houses of parliament, as well as the governors of Russia's 83 regions about the Crimean issue at 3pm Moscow time (1100 GMT).
----------
Home prices in major Chinese cities increased further in February, but at a slower rate than in January, figures released by the National Bureau of Statistics revealed. On month-on-month basis, average prices of new homes increased in 57 of the 70 cities surveyed by the statistical office, which was smaller than the January Figure. Prices advanced 0.2% sequentially in Beijing, and grew 0.4% in Shanghai. Compared to February 2013, new home prices grew in 69 of the 70 major cities for which data was collected.
----------
The search for missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 intensified over two huge arcs of territory north and south of where the plane last made contact. China began searching north-western parts of its territory in areas along the possible northern corridor, said the Chinese ambassador in Kuala Lumpur, Huang Huikang, according to the Xinhua news agency. He added that background checks on all the passengers had found no evidence of links to terrorism or involvement in a possible hijack, Xinhua said. Australia was leading the search on the southern corridor. The New Zealand government said Tuesday it was sending an air force plane to Australia at the request of the Malaysian government to help with the international operation to find the plane.
----------
Iran and six world powers met in Vienna for a new round of talks on scaling back Iran's nuclear programme and on lifting all sanctions targeting the Islamic republic. The start of the meeting was overshadowed by Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif's decision to cancel a dinner with EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton on Monday to protest her meeting with Iranian dissidents during a visit to Tehran, Iranian media said. Ashton is negotiating on behalf of Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia, the US and Germany.
----------
The Thai cabinet decided to end the state of emergency in the capital and surrounding provinces, after an easing of anti-government protests. The decree, in place since January 22, is being lifted on Wednesday, three days before the original legislation was due to expire
----------
Copyright © 2014 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.