Blue Star Share News (BLU)

LONDON (Alliance News) - AstraZeneca Monday rejected a final GBP69 billion takeover proposal from Pfizer Inc, potentially ending the US company's interest in its British rival for the time being.

Pfizer has pledged not to go direct to AstraZeneca's shareholders with a hostile offer following the increased approach of GBP55.00 a share, up from GBP50.00 previously, and also sweetened the proposed cash and shares deal with a higher cash component was rejected.

AstraZeneca said it still felt that undervalued the company. However, it left the door ajar for an improved bid from the US drugs giant, saying that it might be prepared to recommend a bid that was more than 10% above the new proposal.

Shares in the UK pharmaceutical giant dropped at the open Monday, with the stock still the biggest faller on the FTSE 100 early Monday afternoon, down 10% to 4,339.46 pence per share.
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FTSE 100: down 0.4% at 6,831.45
FTSE 250: up 0.3% at 15,444.99
AIM ALL-SHARE: down 0.4% at 793.70
GBP-USD: up at 1.6835
EUR-USD: up at 1.3724
GOLD: up at USD1,303.92 an ounce
OIL (Brent): up at USD110.00 a barrel
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Key UK Corporate News
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FTSE 100: Engineering support services company Babcock International Group reported an increase in profit and revenue for the full year, reflecting a strong performance across the business. Unilever said it had simplified its share structure by buying up the rights left in family trusts by William Hesketh Lever, a move that will boost its full-year core earnings per share by 2% by reducing the share count used in calculating it. Royal Bank of Scotland said on Sunday it is winding down its interest-rate trading operations due to tougher capital requirements under regulators' efforts to make banks safer. The move affects the state-controlled bank's prime broking and over-the-counter clearing businesses for rates.

FTSE 250: Alent said its outlook for 2014 is unchanged after trading so far was in line with its expectations, with a slight increase in demand in its main principle electronics and automotive end-markets. Micro Focus International said it expects to report revenue growth at constant currencies at the upper end of its 3% to 6% guidance range for its last financial year, while its adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation will be in line with market expectations. MITIE Group said its full-year pretax profit increased by 21% due to a "steady flow" of contracts within its key facilities-management business, but it also incurred significant losses from its ongoing exit from its mechanical and electrical engineering construction business and from the design-and-build element of asset management. Grafton Group has signed new five-year revolving credit facilities totalling GBP460 million, with its relationship banks. It said the increased facilities provide the group with additional financial headroom as it continues to execute its growth strategy. The group said the bilateral multi-currency facilities have a maturity date of May 2019.

AIM All-Share: Shares in Northern Bear were trading higher after the firm said it plans to resume payment of a final dividend for the year ended March 31, after it traded ahead of management expectations during the recent year. Blue Star Capital is up after it said Oak Media Ltd has signed an exclusive agreement with Playboy TV Europe for the marketing and promotion of Oak Media's Gibraltar-registered Red 8 casino on Playboy TV's channel inventory. Mirada is trading higher; the company said it expects to report improved earnings and margins for its recent financial year, and said it had secured its biggest contract to date for its multi-screen product with a Latin American digital TV operator, which it said will boost significantly earnings in the current financial year. Also up is ECR Minerals after the company said it had got positive assay results from surface and underground channel sampling at the Itogon gold project in the Philippines. Shares in Weatherly International are trading higher after it said that the projected operating costs at its Tschudi copper project in Namibia had been cut and the overall value of the project had been increased. Legendary Investments is trading lower; the investment company has raised GBP900,000 before expenses via a placing of 818.2 million new shares at 0.11 pence each with institutional and private investors, funds it said it will use to increase its stake in Virtual Stock Holdings.
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Top Economics And General
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The average asking price for a house in the UK jumped 3.6% on month in May, property tracking website Rightmove said - standing at 272,003 pounds, a record high for the month of May. That follows the 2.6% increase in April. On a yearly basis, house prices spiked 8.9% after climbing 7.3% in the previous month. The annual jump marks the highest since October 2007. Prices for properties in London continued to accelerate, prompting fears of a regional bubble with a 16.3% annual increase. The rest of the country was up an average of 4.9%.
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The UK government’s Help to Buy scheme could distort the entire mortgage market and may have to be curbed, The Times reports the governor of the Bank of England as warning. The Times said Mark Carney said that the programme to help new home owners to secure a mortgage with a deposit of as little as 5% may be encouraging a return to risky home loans, adding that the remarks represent the most explicit sign that the Bank of England may formally request a policy change in September.
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Eurozone construction output declined for the first time in five months in March, figures from Eurostat showed. Total construction output fell by 0.6% monthly in March, after a 0.4% growth in the previous month, revised from 0.1%. This was the first decline since November last year, when output decreased 0.9%. Building construction dropped 0.7% in March and output in the civil engineering decreased by 0.6%. On a yearly basis, construction output rose 5.2% in March, which was slower than February's 7.5% increase.
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Core machine orders in Japan surged a seasonally adjusted 19.1% on month in March, the Cabinet Office said - worth JPY936.7 billion. The headline figure shattered forecasts for a 6.0% increase following the upwardly revised 4.6% contraction in February (originally -8.8%). On a yearly basis, core machine orders spiked 16.1% - also blowing past forecasts for an increase of 4.3% following the 10.8% gain in the previous month.
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India's prime minister designate Narendra Modi held meetings with senior party members over the formation of the next government, while the outgoing Congress party met to ponder its crushing electoral defeat. The Bharatiya Janata Party won by a landslide in the general elections, with 282 seats in the 543-member lower house of parliament and 31% ot the total votes. The Congress came a poor second with 44 seats, one-third of its tally in the previous election. BJP leaders Arun Jaitly and Sushma Swaraj were among the party's politicians who met Modi. They also met BJP president Rajnath Singh. Jaitly and Swaraj were leaders of the opposition in the upper and lower houses of the previous parliament and both are contenders for top portfolios in the Modi government.
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Portugal exited its three-year-long international bailout programme Saturday, regaining control of its finances but signalling that austerity measures are not over. Its conservative government met for the occasion to develop a "medium-term strategy" on continuing the reforms and encouraging economic growth. Portugal - which was cash-poor, debt-ridden and threatened with insolvency when it received its bailout in 2011 - has "pulled itself out of a hole," Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho said at a European election campaign event in Aveiro. However, the news hasn't all been good. Statistics released Thursday showed its economy unexpectedly contracted 0.7% quarter-on-quarter in the first three months of the year.
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Five bosses with the company that operated the mine where Turkey's worst mining accident occurred have been arrested, media reports said, citing prosecutors. Operations manager Akin Celik, engineers Yalcin Erdogan and Ertan Ersoy, and security chief Yasin Kurnaz were arrested Sunday on charges of death by negligence. Celik was one of the Soma Holding officials who had taken part in a press conference on the accident Friday.
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The death toll from the worst floods to hit the Balkans in decades rose significantly Sunday as water receded and rescuers gained access to stricken areas of Serbia and Bosnia. In Obrenovac, a town on the southern outskirts of Belgrade, 12 additional bodies were recovered, taking the overall Serbian death toll to 17, Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic said. Tens of thousands have been evacuated across Serbia since the flooding began amid heavy rainfall on Tuesday.
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Afternoon Watchlist (all times British Summer Time)

15:00 Russia Industrial Output
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Tuesday's Key UK Corporate Events

BTG Full Year Results
Greencore Half Year Results
Big Yellow Group Full Year Results
Blur Group Full Year Results
Treatt Half Year Results
Apr Energy Interim Management Statement
Afren Interim Management Statement
Bloomsbury Publishing Full Year Results
Homeserve Full Year Results
Marks & Spencer Group Full Year Results
Paragon Group of Companies Half Year Results
Vodafone Group Full Year Results
Intermediate Capital Group Full Year Results
Victrex Half Year Results
Topps Tiles Half Year Results
Spirax-Sarco Engineering Interim Management Statement
Fusionex International Half Year Results
First Derivatives Full Year Results
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Tuesday's Key Economic Events (all times British Summer Time)

05:30 Japan All Industry Activity Index
06:00 Japan Leading Economic Index
06:00 Japan Coincident Index
07:00 Germany Producer Price Index
09:30 UK Core Consumer Price Index
09:30 UK Consumer Price Index
09:30 UK DCLG House Price Index
09:30 UK PPI Core Output
09:30 UK Producer Price Index
09:30 UK Retail Price Index
13:55 US Redbook index
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By Alice Attwood; aliceattwood@alliancenews.com; @AliceAtAlliance

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