Card Factory Share News (CARD)

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Wednesday.
----------
FTSE 100 - WINNERS
----------
Royal Mail, up 1.9%. Barclays upgraded the postal service operator to Overweight from Equal Weight and hiked its price target to 575 pence from 440p. Royal Mail shares were trading at 444.80p. The bank expects a new pay deal to be negotiated in the first quarter of 2016 and for the company to resolve the issues around its defined benefit pension scheme by the second half. Barclays also said it was confident the cost-cutting measures Royal Mail is taking will keep costs broadly flat, allowing any rise in revenue to feed through to the bottom line. It is the second vote of confidence in Royal Mail shares in as many days. Cantor Fitzgerald upgraded the postal operator to Buy from Hold on Tuesday.

BAE Systems, up 1.9%. RBC Capital Markets upgraded its rating on BAE Systems to Top Pick from Outperform, hiking its target price to 630 pence from 570p. BAE was trading at 501p.
----------
FTSE 100 - LOSERS
----------
ARM Holdings, down 3.0%. The company, which designs semiconductors that are used in Apple's iPhones, was hit after a report in Japan's Nikkei Asian Review said Apple is expected to reduce the output of iPhone 6s and 6s Plus models by around 30% in the January-March quarter compared with its original plans. The report said inventories of the two models, which launched last September, have piled up at retailers in markets ranging from China and Japan to Europe and the US amid lackluster sales. Customers saw little improvement in performance over the previous generation, while dollar appreciation led to sharp price hikes in emerging markets.
----------
FTSE 250 - WINNERS
----------
Card Factory, up 0.9%. Card Factory has appointed Karen Hubbard as its chief executive designate, with effect from February 22. The greeting cards and gifts retailer hired Hubbard from discount retailer B&M European Value Retail, where she has been chief operating officer since 2014. Prior to this, she worked in a number of roles at Asda, the Wal-Mart Stores-owned UK supermarket chain, including heading its property, format development and multi-channel business. She will take over from Card Factory's current chief executive, Richard Hayes, in mid-April. The company also said Christmas trading had been in line with its expectations.
----------
FTSE 250 - LOSERS
----------
Home Retail Group, down 4.5%. The owner of Argos and Homebase gave back some gains made on Tuesday, when it closed up 34% following the news FTSE 100-listed grocer J Sainsbury had made an unsolicited bid for the company in November, which Home Retail rejected. Home Retail has been the subject of speculation about a potential takeover offer ever since its shares slumped in October following a profit warning, hit by investments in restructuring the business and slower-than-expected trading. Sainsbury's shares were down 0.9%.
----------
MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS
----------
Sula Iron & Gold, up 22%. The miner said its chief executive said the assay results from the recent drilling campaign on the Ferensola gold project in Sierra Leone exceeded his expectations and leads him to believe there is a major high-grade deposit. "I am excited by the results of the second batch of drill core samples from the extended scout drilling programme at our Ferensola Gold Project, together with the samples of 'goldstones' as they exceed my best-case expectations," said Nick Warrel.

Corero Network Security, up 15%. The security systems developer said it has secured a USD700,000 order for its SmartWall Threat Defense System product from an undisclosed European internet service provider. Under the order Corero will provide protection against distributed denial of service attacks, a form of hack that makes on online service unavailable by overwhelming it with traffic from multiple sources, as a service for one of the ISP's "high profile" customers.

Midatech Pharma, up 12%. The specialty pharmaceutical company said 2015 revenue will be "slightly ahead of expectations" following its recent acquisitions of Dara BioSciences and Zuplenz, and it also forecast revenue growth at the higher end of market forecasts for 2016. "Following the acquisition of DARA BioSciences and Zuplenz, and further licensing and supply agreements, 2015 has shown significant growth for Midatech, achieving the strategic objectives set out at the time of the IPO and accelerating the company towards sustainable profitability," said Chief Executive Officer Jim Phillips in a statement.
----------
By Sam Unsted; samunsted@alliancenews.com; @SamUAtAlliance

Copyright 2016 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.