Esure Group Share News (ESUR)

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Thursday.
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FTSE 100 - WINNERS
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J Sainsbury, up 0.8%. Shares in the supermarket chain were up after Home Retail Group, which reported growth in sales in the first quarter of its financial year, said its takeover by Sainsbury's remains on track to complete in the third quarter of 2016. Home Retail shares were up 0.4%.
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FTSE 100 - LOSERS
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Antofagasta, down 6.0%. Canaccord cut the Chile-focused miner to Hold from Buy, according to traders.

Anglo American, down 2.6%, BHP Billiton, 2.3%, Glencore, down 2.1%, Rio Tinto, down 1.4%. Mining stocks were lower as data showed China's consumer inflation slowed for first time in seven months in May. Consumer prices in China were up 2.0% year-on-year in May, the National Bureau of Statistics said, below forecasts for 2.3% inflation, which would have been unchanged from the April reading. Inflation continues to remain below the full-year target of 3.0%. Another report from the NBS showed that producer prices fell 2.8% year-on-year versus expectations for a decline of 3.2% and after sliding 3.4% in the previous month.

Johnson Matthey, down 1.7%. The stock went ex-dividend meaning new buyers no longer qualify for the latest dividend payout.
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FTSE 250 - WINNERS
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RPC Group, up 3.6%. The plastic products firm said it has agreed a deal to acquire fellow UK-listed British Polythene Industries and will launch a share placing to part-fund the deal. RPC will pay 470.00 pence per share in cash and 0.60141 of new RPC shares for British Polythene, valuing the group at a total of GBP261.0 million. The total per share value of the deal will be around 940.00p per British Polythene share. To part-fund the deal, RPC will place shares through an accelerated bookbuild, run by Deutsche Bank and Panmure Gordon, to raise around GBP90.0 million. Shares in British Polythene were up 32% at 956.50p.

Auto Trader Group, up 1.7%. The automotive marketplace operator launched a rolling programme of share buybacks, as its annual pretax profit rocketed higher and underlying results also were strong. Auto Trader said its pretax profit for the financial year to March 27 was GBP155.0 million, a massive rise on the GBP10.9 million it made the year before due to costs booked that year on its listing in London and higher financing costs for the group's debt. Operating profit, before the one-offs and finance costs, grew to GBP169.6 million from GBP133.1 million, up 27%. The group also declared a final dividend of 1.0p per share, meaning its total annual payout will be 1.5p.
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FTSE 250 - LOSERS
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Essentra, down 27%. The plastic and fibre products company issued a profit warning for 2016 following a deteriorating in trading in its filter products business. Essentra said it is "unlikely" to meet the trading expectations for the year to the end of December that it had set out in its annual results in February. Essentra said its Filter Products unit, which makes filters for cigarettes, has been hit by a challenging market backdrop and projects either not being commercialised or being delayed.

Esure Group, down 4.2%. The insurer was downgraded to Sell from Hold by Berenberg. The German bank said Esure looks set to struggle to meet earnings per share and dividends per share expectations. "We believe esure’s growth strategy is inferior to peers’, and a requirement to retain capital for expansion means there is potential to disappoint on dividend growth."
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MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS
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CloudTag, up 28% st 5.68p. The wearable device and software company said it and its European distributor are concluding initial product deliveries with a number of high street and online retailers and is holding talks with online retail giant Amazon.com Inc. CloudTag said it is now in the process of completing initial delivery requirements for a range of retailers alongside distributor Second Chance. CloudTag did not name any of the retailers for which the deliveries are being completed, but said it includes the largest online e-commerce and cloud computing company in the UK and US and a major British multinational department store, amongst a series of others.

Webis Holdings, up 12%. The gaming and racetrack operator said its WatchandWager.com subsidiary has extended its contract to run the Cal Expo Harness Racing track in Sacramento, California through to 2021. WatchandWager entered a contract to run the track in 2012. No financial details were disclosed. "WatchandWager remains committed to the US racing industry by providing live harness racing to fans and supporting California horsemen with revenue from wagering. We look forward to building upon the progress over the next five years of the contract," said WatchandWager President Ed Comins.

Wincanton, up 8.2%. The contract logistics operator reinstated its dividend for the year to the end of March following growth in profit and revenue and as the group substantially completed its restructuring. Wincanton said it will pay a 5.5 pence dividend for the year, having not paid a dividend the year before as it undertook a restructuring and booked charges on unprofitable contracts. The group said it intends to institute a progressive dividend policy from here on, with annual payout growth to be broadly matched to underlying earnings growth. Wincanton's reported pretax profit grew substantially, up to GBP65.8 million from GBP24.9 million a year earlier.
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MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS
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China New Energy, off 21% at 2.11p. The bioenergy technology provider said it has raised GBP750,000 through an equity raise to accelerate its field work in Africa and to give the company the option to invest further in new or existing projects. China New Energy has issued 37.5 million shares at a price of 2.0 pence each after an unnamed institutional fund manager subscribed for the shares, which represent 8.44% of the company's enlarged issued share capital. "We have recently announced the potential projects in Africa and this investment will assist us with the initial work needed to meet the early project milestones as well as providing additional working capital for our other projects," said Chairman Weijun Yu.

Immunodiagnostic Systems Holdings, down 6.0%. The diagnostics company lowered its expectations for annual revenue following an "unexpected" reduction in royalty revenue in the final quarter of its financial year. The company said its largest customer from which it attains royalties recently notified IDS that it has commenced the transition of its business from the assay on which IDS receives royalty income to a new proprietary assay. In addition, the customer also informed IDS that the royalties payable for the quarter ended March 31 would be lower than it had originally indicated. As a result, while total royalty revenue for the year will be in line with the prior year's GBP4.8 million, the unexpected reduction in the final quarter will mean overall revenue will be closer to GBP38 million rather than the previous estimate of GBP39 million.
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By Arvind Bhunjun; arvindbhunjun@alliancenews.com; @ArvindBhunjun

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