Cobham Share News (COB)

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Wednesday.
----------
FTSE 100 - WINNERS
----------
CRH, up 2.8%. The Irish building materials company benefited from positive US non-residential construction data. The US Architectural Billings Index, a leading indicator of non-residential construction activity in the US, delivered a sixth straight month of growth in July, which Davy Stockbrokers said should read positively for London-listed building materials firms like CRH. The index came in at 51.5 in July, slightly below the 52.6 recorded in June but still above 50-point line which separates growth and contraction. The American Institute of Architects, which puts together the index, did however warn of some volatility in the US construction market in the months ahead as the country gears up for its Presidential Election in November, which may result in some investment decisions on infrastructure projects being delayed. CRH has strong exposure to the non-residential and residential construction markets in the US.

BHP Billiton, up 0.8%. Macquarie upgraded the Anglo-Australian miner to Neutral from Underperform. BHP on Tuesday said it entered the red in the last financial year after a steep drop in revenue caused it to report a loss from its operations and its finance costs increased, resulting in its dividend being slashed 76%.
----------
FTSE 100 - LOSERS
----------
Admiral Group, down 8.2% at 2,071.00 pence. The insurer hiked its dividend and posted higher pretax profit for the first half of 2016, but shares sank amid concerns about a fall in its Solvency II ratio and as pretax profit slightly missed expectations. Admiral said its pretax profit for the half to the end of June was GBP189.5 million, up from GBP181.7 million a year earlier. This was a slight miss against consensus expectations for GBP191.8 million. The company's combined operating ratio was 82.2%, compared to 82.7%. Admiral declared an interim dividend of 62.90p per share, up 23% year-on-year from 51.0p. The dividend comprises a 36.8p normal dividend, 14.2p special dividend and a further return of 11.9p per share from surplus capital not required for solvency. Shore Capital said the "noise" about the company's Solvency II position, which dipped to 180% at the end of June from 206% at the end of 2015, was a key concern, along with worries around the impact of the UK voting to leave the European Union. Shore kept a Sell recommendation on the stock. However, the shares touched on Tuesday an all-time high of 2,288.00p.

Standard Chartered, down 3.4%. HSBC downgraded the emerging markets-focused lender to Hold from Buy.

Schroders, down 1.3%. Australian bank Macquarie cut the asset manager to Underperform from Neutral.
----------
FTSE 250 - WINNERS
----------
Indivior, up 17%. The drugmaker said it has received positive top-line results for the pivotal phase 3 clinical trial of RBP-6000 buprenorphine monthly depot. RBP-6000 is an investigational new drug for the treatment of opioid use disorder. Indivior said it remains on track to complete the data analysis of the phase 3 trial as well as the open-label long-term assessment of the safety and tolerability of the drug by the first quarter of 2017. "We believe that RBP-6000 can potentially transform the treatment of opioid dependence, if approved, by possibly reducing patients' treatment administration days from 365 a year to 12," Chief Executive Shaun Thaxter said. Numis believes the drug could achieve USD500.0 million of sales in 2020, and reach "blockbuster status" in 2025.

Balfour Beatty, up 6.7%. The construction and infrastructure company said it has reinstated its dividend after its pretax loss narrowed in its first half. The group said its pretax loss for the six months to the end of June was GBP21.0 million, narrowed from the GBP150.0 million loss reported a year earlier, when Balfour booked writedowns on onerous contracts in its UK construction arm. Balfour had said at the time that more than 90% of these problem contracts would be at practical or financial completion by the end of 2016. In light of the "fundamental changes" undertaken in the business to reduce its "poor contract discipline" and "unaffordable overhead costs", Balfour said it was reinstating the interim dividend and will pay 0.90 pence per share, having paid no dividend a year earlier.

Savills, up 5.4%. The property adviser was raised to Buy from Neutral by Citigroup.

Cobham, up 4.1%. The aerospace and defence technology company said its chief executive will step down at the end of 2016 and will be replaced by the boss of wireless components designer Laird. Bob Murphy, Cobham's current CEO, will step down no later than the end of 2016 to "pursue other opportunities", Cobham said. He will be replaced by David Lockwood, currently the CEO at Laird, who will join the company no later than January 1, 2017. Laird will replace Lockwood with Tony Quinlan, its current chief financial officer. He will take the top job on September 5, when Lockwood will step down. Laird shares were down 6.6%, the worst midcap performer.
----------
FTSE 250 - LOSERS
----------
Jupiter Fund Management, down 1.8%. The asset manager was downgraded to Underperform from Neutral by Macquarie.
----------
MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS
----------
Newmark Security, up 13%. The security systems provider said its pretax profit nearly halved in the year the end of April 30 due to investments the company made in its operations. Newmark said it made a GBP1.2 million pretax profit in the financial year to the end of April, down from GBP2.1 million a year earlier. Revenue declined to GBP21.8 million from GBP22.9 million due to lower volumes in the firm's Asset Protection division, while its gross margin decreased to 41.75 from 42.5%. The group declared a flat dividend of 0.10p per share. "The opportunity pipeline however continues to grow, and although the conversion into sales has been slower than hoped, we have seen robust growth in certain product lines," said Newmark Chairman Maurice Dwek. "The group retains a significant cash position and the board remains optimistic about trading in future years and has therefore maintained the proposed dividend for the year at the same level as last year," he added.

Tracsis, up 12%. The transportation technology provider it has won a contract with an unnamed North American Class 1 railroad operator for its Remote Condition Monitoring technology. Tracsis said this will mark its first major contract win in North American. Under the terms of the contract, the order will comprise of the purchase of RCM hardware units, a software licence for the group's traffic analytics, and various ancillary products. The group's RCM technology is designed to report the status of critical infrastructure in real time, in order to carry out preventative maintenance. Tracsis said the total order value is "in excess" of USD400,000, and the company said it expects this order to be fulfilled before the end of 2016.

ServicePower Technologies, up 9.1%. The workforce management software provider said it has signed a two-year, USD1.5 million contract extension with an existing client. The client is an unnamed US consumer products manufacturer, which uses the firm's ServiceScheduling, ServiceOperations and ServiceStats systems. The contract extension will involve the client migrating its ServiceScheduling system from an on-premise deployment to a hosted deployment managed by ServicePower. The client will also expand its ServiceMobility deployment.
----------
MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS
----------
Xtract Resources, down 19%. The miner said it has not yet received an initial payment from Nexus Capital and Mineral Technologies International regarding the pair's proposed acquisition of its Manica project in Mozambique. In May, the company struck a deal back to sell Manica to Nexus Capital and Mineral Technologies International for a total of USD17.5 million and the original plan was for the entirety of that sum to be paid in cash upon completion. New adjusted terms were then agreed in July for Nexus and Mineral Technologies to make an initial payment of USD2.0 million to Xtract and, in return, the total consideration was lowered to USD15.0 million. Xtract said this initial payment, which was expected last Friday, has not yet been received and said it was currently in discussions with Nexus Capital and Mineral Technologies International regarding the structure of the transaction.

Trafalgar New Homes, down 12%. The housebuilder said revenue and pretax profit for its current financial year will be lower than market expectations, as it anticipates the sale of its substantial property in Kent to complete after the year-end. The property developer operating in southeast England had been expecting to secure an off-plan sale for its "new substantial detached house" in Speldhurst, Kent prior to March 31, 2017, when the current financial year ends, meaning it would be recognised for the current year. Trafalgar said it has changed its accounting policies in line with the updated accounting standards so that property sales are only recognised upon completion of the contract rather than on the exchange. Trafalgar said build work for the house is expected to be completed in the spring of 2017 with a sale expected to complete during the summer of 2017.
----------
By Arvind Bhunjun; arvindbhunjun@alliancenews.com; @ArvindBhunjun

Copyright 2016 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.