FLX.L Share News (FLX)

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers on the main London indices midday Tuesday.

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FTSE 100 - Winners

easyJet, up 6.5%, is the leading gainer on the FTSE 350. The airline reported that pretax profit for the year to September 30 rose by 51% to GBP478 million, up from the GBP317 million reported last year. A 17.4% return on capital employed was up from 11.3% in 2012. EasyJet said its proposed dividend per ordinary share for the year was 33.5 pence, up 56% on last year's 21.5 pence per share. easyJet board also announced a special dividend of 44.1 pence a share.

AMEC is up 1.5% after it said its year-to-date trading remains in line with expectations. The oil services company said its order book at the end of October was GBP4.0 billion, an 11% increase on the GBP3.6 billion level at the end of October in 2012, as the company benefited from strong performance in the UK North Sea and US renewable markets. AMEC also said that it remains on track to achieve an earnings per share of greater than 100 pence in 2014.

TUI Travel is up 0.2%. TUI has sold its interest in UK air-traffic controller NATS Holdings for GBP38 million. TUI said it will sell 87.4% of its shareholding and loan note interests in The Airline Group, a 41.9% shareholder of NATS. It said it would retain a small "stub" shareholding in the group. TUI said the holding was non-core, and the sale price exceeds the value at which it was carrying the investment on its books. Thomas Cook also sold its shareholding in NATS.

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FTSE 100 - Losers

Intertek Group is down 4.4%. The testing company said it has agreed to buy one of the largest building products testing companies in North America, as previous acquisitions helped lift revenues in the first 10 months of the year. However, it said that markets have remained weak for longer than it had hoped in Europe, particularly chemicals and pharmaceuticals, and in its minerals division. "A continuation of the tough first half trading headwinds has left second half organic growth below our expectations," Steve Woolf, analyst at Numis adds.

Smiths Group falls 2.7% after it warned that its outlook has deteriorated somewhat. Exchange rates have gone against it, and its medical unit continues to struggle. In a trading update, the company said "expectations for the year remain broadly in line with the outlook given at the full year results, although foreign exchange translation is expected to be a headwind at current rates and sales to government-funded customers remain a risk."

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FTSE 250 - Winners

Afren jumps 8.6%. Afren and its AIM-listed partner Lekoil reported that drilling results at the OPL310 site offshore Nigeria are nearly four times higher than previous expectations. The two companies said that the OPL310 site showed a gross recoverable P50 resource estimated at 774 million barrels of oil equivalent, almost four times more than their originally targeted 202 million barrels. Afren holds a 22.86% participating interest and 40% economic interest at the site. Both companies said they intend to drill the OPL310 appraisal well in the second half of 2014, ahead of their original development plan, on the positive results.

Enterprise Inns is up 7% after it said its net earnings were starting to improve as its asset sales and restructuring programme started to pay off. The pub operator has been selling off pubs in an effort to retain the best performers and to reduce its debt burden. Despite reporting a net loss of GBP4 million for the year to end-September, compared with a profit of GBP44 million a year earlier as revenues declined to GBP639 million from GBP692 million due to the disposals, it said its like-for-like net income was up 0.6% in the final quarter of the fiscal year. It successfully reduced debt, with bank borrowings at GBP41 million at the end of the year compared with GBP310 million a year earlier.

Keller Group is up 4.4%. The engineering firm said that trading in the four months to the end of October has continued the improving trend established in the first half of the year. In an interim management statement, the company said the value of its like-for-like order book for work to be completed over the next 12 months is now slightly above the same period last year. Keller said - given the better-than-expected improvement in the overall margin in the period to the end of October, driven largely by business efficiencies and strong contract outcomes - it expects its results for the full year to be slightly above the top end of current market expectations. Numis has increased its price target to 1,120.00 pence from 1,085.00p, maintaining an Add recommendation, while Jefferies has raised its price target to 1,360.00p from 1,350.00p, reiterating its Buy recommendation.

Thomas Cook Group climbs 3.9%. Like blue-chip TUI Travel, Thomas Cook said that it has sold its interest in NATS Holdings for GBP38 million. Thomas Cook said it will sell 91.5% of its shareholding and loan note interests in The Airline Group, while retaining the balance. It said it is will use the cash to pay down debt, as part of its target to raise GBP100 million to GBP150 million for that purpose by its financial year 2015.

Centamin edges up 0.8% after it further reduced its stake in Nyota Minerals. Nyota said that its key shareholder has sold a total of 16 million shares between November 7 and November 14. Centamin had been in talks with the Nyota about its future, but started reducing its stake after Nyota signed a sales agreement with another exploration company. Following the disposal of shares, Centamin now holds 111 million shares or 12.6% of the company's issued share capital, down from 17.2% in early October.

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FTSE 250 - Losers

Bodycote is down 4.3% despite reporting that revenue had grown by 6.9% for the four months from July 1 to October 31 boosted by its automotive business. Jefferies analyst Andy Douglas was surprised by the fall. Bodycote "have done a good job again," says Douglas, who continues to like the company going into 2014, "with most engineers in the UK flagging currency headwinds, I can't believe anyone was expecting upgrades," he adds.

IG Group Holdings is down 3.4% even though it reported that it had traded "satisfactorily" through the second quarter of the year. Despite markets being more subdued than in the first quarter, it said, revenues grew year-on-year in September and October. Numis analyst James Hamilton is unsure why the company is amongst the biggest fallers. Hamilton reiterates his second-quarter forecast for the company, expecting the company to report second-quarter revenues of GBP92.0 million, ahead of last year's second quarter revenues of GBP87.5 million, but slightly less than first-quarter revenues of GBP93.6 million.

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AIM - Winners

Sierra Rutile jumps 32% after it confirmed that it is currently engaged in discussion with potentially interested parties for the possible takeover of the company. The company said that it made the announcement in response to media speculation and that there can be no certainty that an offer will be made for the company.

Coastal Energy is up 22%. The exploration and production company has entered into a definitive merger agreement for Compañía Española de Petróleos to acquire all of Coastal Energy's issued and outstanding shares. Under the deal, CEPSA will acquire the shares at a price of CAD19.00 per share at an aggregate value of CAD2.3 billion including the assumption of CAD51 million in net debt.

Crawshaw Group climbs 22% as it says sales growth has accelerated in recent weeks and gross margins continue to improve across most of its stores. In late September, the company said like-for-like sales were up 10% in the first eight weeks of the second half of the financial year. On Tuesday it said that like-for-like sales during the seven weeks since then are up 18%, and at a higher gross margin.

Lekoil, up 20%. Like its partner Afren, the company is benefiting from better-than-expected drilling results at the OPL310 site. Lekoil also announced that it has decided to terminate the binding conditional sale and purchase agreement with Pan Petroleum Aje Limited, Pan-Petroleum Nigeria Holding BV and Pan-Petroleum Cyprus Limited for its OML113 site offshore Nigeria due to an inability to agree final terms. Lekoil said the parties have the right to call a USD3 million bid bond entered into as part of the agreement, which the company will finance out of its cash reserves, allowing the company to focus on its discovery at OPL310.

Falanx Group is up 11%. The security and risk management consultancy said it made a pretax profit in its first results since its listing on the AIM. Falanx said it made a GBP35,150 pretax profit for the six months to September, compared to a GBP73,774 pretax loss in the period to March 31.

Caza Oil & Gas climbs 10% after it achieved positive results from its initial test well at the West Copperline Property in New Mexico. The company said the horizontal Bone Spring test well at the site reached its intended total depth of 15,035 feet and was subsequently fracture stimulated in November, producing a peak 24 hour flow rate of 800 barrels of oil and 1.2 million cubic feet of natural gas. The company said the numbers equated to 1,002 barrels of oil equivalent on the peak day at the company's 62.5% owned site, where ongoing clean up is taking place.

Plethora jumps 5.5%. The company has said it has received marketing approval for its premature ejaculation treatment from the European Commission, a key step in its long-lasting efforts to commercialize the treatment. It expects to file for marketing approval from the US Food and Drug Administration early in the New Year.

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AIM - Losers

Alba Minerals drops 20% after is said its joint venture partner FOSSE Investments has agreed to take shares in Alba in order for the company to further contribute to the joint venture account. The uranium-focused exploration company said it will satisfy GBP21,000 of the contribution it has agreed to make to the joint venture by the issue of 6 million shares to FOSSE at a price of 0.35 pence per share.

Invu falls 18% after the company's shareholders approved the cancellation of its AIM listing.

Kibo Mining is down 9.5%. Kibo shares are down despite reporting that its Imweru drill programme is running 20% ahead of schedule and nearing completion in Tanzania. The gold, nickel, coal and uranium producer, operating in Africa, said the average daily drilling at Imweru stands at 109 metres, above the 75 metres originally planned and it has now completed 65% of the programme.

Superglass Holdings is down 6.9% after it swung to a loss for the full-year as it lamented the UK government's flagship energy saving scheme. The insulation company posted a pretax loss of GBP7.0 million for the period ended 31 August, compared with a GBP6.8 million profit a year earlier. Superglass blamed the replacement of the UK government-initiated Carbon Emissions Reduction Target with the Green Deal and Energy Companies Obligation, which have struggled to take off.

GW Pharmaceuticals is off 6.7% after it swung into a pretax loss of GBP10.4 million from GBP1.2 million as revenues declined and research and development costs rose in the full year ended September 30.

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By James Kemp; jameskemp@alliancenews.com; @jamespkemp

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