Gooch & Housego Share News (GHH)

LONDON (Alliance News) - Stocks in London ended higher Tuesday with the FSTE indices shrugging off sharp falls from Hargreaves Lansdown and Woodford Patient Capital Trust, following fund manager Neil Woodford's decision to suspend redemptions from his equity funds.US President Donald Trump was in the UK Tuesday on the second day of a three-day state visit and promised a "phenomenal" trade deal between the two countries when the UK leaves the EU - pushing the pound higher."Our nations have more than USD1 trillion invested in each other's economies," Trump told reporters after talks with UK Prime Minister Theresa May in Downing Street."As the UK makes preparations to exit the EU, the US is committed to a phenomenal trade deal between the US and the UK," Trump said. "There is tremendous potential in that trade deal, I say probably two and even three times what we're doing right now."Trump's announcement will please Conservative eurosceptics who want a new party leader to prioritize liberal free-trade deals with non-EU economies even it means Britain leaving the EU with no withdrawal agreement.May will step down as leader of her Conservative Party on Friday.The FTSE 100 index closed up 29.49 points, or 0.4%, at 7,214.29.The FTSE 250 ended up 130.99 points, or 0.7% at 19,008.13, and the AIM All-Share closed down 7.73 points, or 0.8%, at 941.93.The Cboe UK 100 ended up 0.5% at 12,244.52, the Cboe UK 250 closed up 0.5% at 17,047.23, and the Cboe Small Companies ended down 0.3% at 11,743.49."European markets rebounded on Tuesday as risk appetite improved, extending their gains as Wall Street opened on the front foot. Hopes of a quick resolution to the US-Mexico trade spat and the prospect of a lower for longer interest rate environment saw sentiment lift. The trade sensitive Dax jumped over 1.1%. The FTSE, still higher on the day, lagged behind its European peers owing to weaker oil and metal prices and Hargreaves Lansdown taking a hit from Woodford," said CityIndex's Fiona Cincotta.Stocks in New York were sharply higher at the London equities close, with the DJIA up 1.7%, the S&P 500 index up 1.6% and the Nasdaq Composite 2.0% higher.The pound was quoted at USD1.2675 at the London equities close, higher against USD1.2622 at the close Monday.Cincotta added: "Who would have thought it but President Trump's appearance in the UK could offer some support to the pound? Trump's promise of a lucrative trade deal between the UK and the US post Brexit is offering a glimmer of hope to pound traders, in the face of an increasingly likely no deal Brexit come October 31. This is the clearest that Trump has been regarding a UK-US trade deal and was tonic for the pound as it tries to claw back towards USD1.27."In Paris the CAC 40 ended up 0.6%, while the DAX 30 in Frankfurt ended 1.5% higher.The euro stood at USD1.1240 at the European equities close, higher than USD1.1204 late Monday.Among London's best performing blue chip stocks was budget airline easyJet, climbing 3.5%. easyJet's rise comes as the company is facing demotion from London's FTSE 100 index, sitting as it does right at the bottom of the index following a profit warning earlier in the year. The budget airline joined the index back in 2013, where it has remained ever since, but will drop out of the FTSE 100 in this weeks index review. Sinking to the bottom of the FTSE 100 was Hargreaves Lansdown, closing the session down 4.7%. Shares in the fund supermarket fell after star fund manager Neil Woodford suspended withdrawals from its flagship equity fund, which had been a constituent of Hargreaves' favourite fund investment list.Hargreaves on Monday removed LF Woodford Equity Income Fund and Woodford Income Focus Fund from its Wealth 50 list."As the fund can't be traded, we have made the decision to remove it from our Wealth 50 list of favourite funds. We have also removed the Woodford Income Focus Fund," Hargreaves said in a statement. On Monday, Woodford suspended withdrawals from his equity income fund as the fund's underperformance resulted in significant outflow of investors. The decision is suspected to have been made after Kent County Council sought to redeem its GBP263 million investment in the equity fund.The equity fund is managed by Woodford Investment Management, which also manages London-listed Woodford Patient Capital Trust. Trading in Woodford Patient Capital Trust remains unaffected by the suspension.Woodford Patient Capital Trust ended the day as the FTSE 250's worst performer, shedding 7.2%.NewRiver REIT closed as the FTSE 250's second worst performer, losing 4.9%, after it sold an Asda foodstore and petrol filling station in Llanelli, Wales, to a private investor for GBP17.9 million.The real estate investment trust said that the disposal represents a net initial yield of 6.9% and a 1% discount to March 2019 valuation.At the other end of the midcap index, gaming company 888 Holdings closed 7.9% higher after it said the continuation of strong trading momentum, marketing investments, and the release of its Orbit casino platform has led to rise in like-for-like revenue and new customers growth. For the period from January 1 to May 18, the company recorded 6% growth in constant currency adjusted like-for-like revenue and 2% rise in reported revenue. New customer acquisition was up by 20% year-on-year.888 said strong momentum continued across a several regulated markets driven by Sport and Casino businesses, partly offset by Bingo and Poker.In UK, the company continued to achieve encouraging growth, it said, with revenue increasing by 18% on an adjusted like-for-like basis and 8% on a reported basis.Budget airline Wizz Air closed the day as one of the FTSE 250's best performers, rising 7.1%, after reporting strong double-digit traffic growth in both May and in the rolling 12 months to date as it continued to expand its network.In May, the Eastern-European focused budget airline saw passengers numbers up 22% to 3.5 million from 2.8 million in the same month of 2018. On a rolling 12-month basis, passengers are up 17% to 35.7 million from 30.5 million.Capacity - measured in the number of seats - rose 20% in May to 3.7 million from 3.1 million, while it increased 15% on a 12-month basis to 38.4 million.Load factor - a key measure for the airline industry - was up 2.0 percentage points in May, reaching 93.9%. It increased 1.5 points over the year to 93.0%. Elsewhere on the London Stock Exchange, rental equipment company Vp ended the day up 10% after hiking its annual dividend following a profit and revenue rise in another "strong" year, with the new financial year starting well.For the year ended March, pretax profit widened 9.1% to GBP33.6 million from GBP30.8 million the year prior. This was after revenue rose 26% to GBP382.8 million from GBP303.6 million the year before. Vp proposed a 22.0 pence per share final dividend, up 15% from 19.2p the year prior. For the full year, the dividend rose 16% to 30.2p from 26.0p the year before. On London's junior market, Gooch & Housego closed down 22% after its profit dropped sharply in the first half of its current financial year due to a downturn in demand for laser components.In addition, the optical components manufacturer said its Chief Operating Officer Alex Warnock will step down at the end of September after five years in the role. G&H said it currently does not intend to replace Warnock and the three manufacturing heads will report directly to Chief Executive Mark Webster.G&H said pretax profit in the six months to the end of March dipped to GBP1.5 million from GBP5.2 million reported a year earlier.G&H explained that it has seen a downturn in demand for critical components used in industrial lasers for microelectronic manufacturing, particularly from China. Revenue, meanwhile, rose to GBP59.7 million from GBP55.6 million the year ago. G&H highlighted that, excluding the impact of foreign exchange, revenue growth was 4.1%, and excluding the impact of foreign exchange and acquisitions, revenue fell by 5.4%. Focusing back on the US, Federeal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Tuesday said the US central bank will act "as appropriate" to sustain the economic expansion.Powell addressed the recent developments involving trade negotiations and other matters, acknowledging that the Fed does not know how or when these issues will be resolved. Brent oil was quoted at USD61.78 a barrel at the equities close, higher than USD61.46 at the close Monday, amid Trump's impromptu Mexico trade tariffs may be called off.Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said his country and the US are likely to reach an agreement before next Monday, when the US intends to slap a 5% duty on all Mexican imports. A Mexican delegation is in Washington to prepare a meeting between Mexican Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday.Lopez Obrador said Mexico's representatives were talking to the US commerce and agriculture secretaries as well as other officials."The talks are going well, very well," the president said at his daily press conference.Gold was quoted at USD1,321.10 an ounce at the London equities close, up from USD1,319.00 late Monday.The economic events calendar on Wednesday has Chinese Caixin services PMI overnight, and Markit services PMI readings from France, Germany, the Eurozone and the UK at 0850 BST, 0855 BST, 0900 BST and 0930 BST, respectively.Later in the day, there is Eurozone producer price index at 1000 BST and US Markit PMI reading at 1445 BST.The UK corporate calendar on Wednesday has full year results from Biffa and GB Group, with first quarter results from Card Factory. Ryanair will issue its May traffic statistics.