Petards Share News (PEG)

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

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FTSE 100 - Winners

Shire is up 4%. The company has agreed to buy US rare disease company ViroPharma for about USD4.2 billion in cash, an acquisition that it expects to boost earnings straight away. In a joint statement, the companies said Shire will pay about USD50 a share for the US company. Shire expects to achieve USD150 million in annual cost synergies by 2015 through the acquisition, over and above the cost savings it hopes to achieve through its ongoing restructuring programme. It said its rare diseases treatments will now have a revenue base of USD2 billion.

BG Group, up 1%, has sold more interest in Queensland Curtis LNG to China National Offshore Oil Corporation for USD1.93 billion. The company said CNOOC will increase its holding by 40-percentage-points to 50% of the Australian site, and in return will pay the near USD2 billion pricetag and reimburse BG Group for project expenditure at Queensland Curtis commensurate to its increased interest for the period between January 1, 2012 and September 30, 2013. BG said it will supply CNOOC with a further 5 million tonnes per year of liquefied natural gas for 20 years beginning in 2015. CNOOC also will acquire a further 20% interest in the company's reserves and resources at its Walloons Fairway region of the Surat Basin in Queensland, bringing its total interest to 25%, and it will acquire a 25% equity interest in certain other upstream tenements held by BG Group.

Hammerson climbs 0.9% after it said it has signed 94 new leases across its portfolio in the year to date, representing GBP9.1 million per annum in revenue. In an interim management statement for the period July 1 to November 10, the retail property developer said the total value of new leases signed in the year was 82% higher than in the same period in 2012. The company continues to expand its portfolio with construction work continuing at Les Terrasses du Port, its shopping and leisure destination in Marseille, while new leases have been signed with Hugo Boss and Ted Baker, which is opening its first French store outside of Paris.

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FTSE 100 - Losers

British Sky Broadcasting Group is down 9.5% in the wake of the weekend news that growing television rival BT Group had beaten it to secure exclusive rights to show Champions League and Europa League football matches in the UK for three seasons. The loss of the high-profile rights is likely to have a number of negative implications for Sky, says Berenberg: "Having a competitor who is prepared to pay more than you, particularly one as deep-pocketed as BT, cannot be a positive."

ITV's share price, down 1.4%, is also under pressure in the wake of BT's deal. The broadcaster will lose rights to show any UK club football from the start of the BT deal. It recently lost out to the BBC on rights to show FA Cup games. Berenberg believes that the lack of club football is likely to result in a medium-term negative for ITV. However, perhaps more worrying, with BT Sport offering to show certain matches for free, in time other sports rights currently shown on free television could be distributed in the same way.

RSA Insurance Group is down 9%. The insurance group has warned that problems within its Irish business will result in its full-year operatiung profits being GBP70 million lower than the market had expected. RSA has instructed PricewaterhouseCoopers to conduct an independent review into the group's financial controls, with results expected to be published at the end of the year. This latest statement, issued after the market close Friday, comes hot-on-the-heels of the company's interim management statement last Tuesday, in which RSA warned that it expects its full-year weather losses to be "materially above planning assumptions". Analysts say uncertainty is likely weigh on the share price until the results of the review are known. Shore Capital has downgraded the stock to Hold from Buy as a consequence of both issues, while Barclays has reiterated its Underweight rating.

Glencore Xstrata falls 0.5%. The mining company said its PASAR copper smelter and refinery in the Philippines has sustained 'heavy structural damage' as a result of the devastating typhoon Haiyan, according to Reuters on Monday. PASAR said in a statement that it is currently inspecting its facilities and assessing the impact, estimating a return to normal operations could take at least 4 to 6 weeks.

Admiral Group is down 0.5%. The company's third quarter revenue has suffered as a result of competition in the UK car insurance market, but said it is still on track to meet its expectations for the full year. Shore Capital analyst Eamonn Flanagan described Admiral's interim management statement as "brief but worrying". Group turnover decreased by 7.3% to GBP528 million for the quarter to September 30, compared with GBP570 million for the corresponding period last year. The decline was caused by a 12% decline in UK car insurance revenue, which came in at GBP440 million for the third quarter, a figure Flanagan described as "somewhat disturbing".

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FTSE 250 - Winners

Lonmin is up 6.3%. The platinum miner said it swung to a pretax profit in its full year compared to a pretax loss in the previous year, as production got back on track. The company posted a total pretax profit of USD140.0 million for the twelve months ended September 30, compared to a pretax loss of USD698.0 million the previous year. Lonmin took far lower impairment costs in the recent year, at USD157.0 million versus USD726.0 million the previous year. The company started to recover from mine closures and disruptions in 2012, when the Marikana miners strike left 34 mineworkers dead. Police had opened fire on workers who were demonstrating against working conditions in South Africa.

888 Holdings is up 4.4% after it joined rival bwin.party digital entertainment in getting clearance to be an operator in the New Jersey online gaming market, which opens later this month. In a statement, 888 said its 888 Atlantic Ltd and AAPN New Jersey LLC units have been granted a transactional waiver by the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement and are authorised to act as online casino gaming services providers to Caesars Interactive Entertainment New Jersey LLC. The New jersey online gaming market is set to be opened as a newly regulated market and is attracting the world's biggest online gaming companies. It is the third US state to open its market.

Dignity climbs 2.1%. The funeral service provider's growth in operating profits over the third quarter has been slower than in the first half of the year, but was still GBP700,000 ahead of the same quarter in 2012. Underlying operating profit, excluding profit on sale of fixed assets and external transaction costs, was GBP60.2 million in the 39 week period ended September 27, compared with GBP53.4 million for the corresponding period the year prior. The company said its GBP58.3 million acquisition of funeral and crematoria business Yew Holdings was continuing to integrate well, contributing GBP 3.1 million of underlying operating profit in the year to date, slightly ahead of management expectations. At the half year, total underlying operating profit was GBP45.3 million, up from GBP39.2 million at the same point in 2012, while Yew Holdings had contributed GBP2.1 million at that point, which was then described as in line with Dignity's expectations.

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FTSE 250 - Losers

Cobham is down 5.4%. The aerospace and security technology company has cut its outlook for next year, warning that budgets in key US defence and security markets were continuing to deteriorate. Although trading in-line with expectations this year, Cobham's outlook for the next year is less good as the US defence budget environment is showing signs of further deterioration. The company is now predicting that organic revenues will again fall by low-to-mid single digits in 2014, having previously predicted modest growth. Liberum Capital is expecting a 5% cut to consensus full-year 2014 earning per share expectations.

Serco Group is down 3.8%. The outsourcing company which runs public services across Britain, including prisons, trains and even the maintenance of atomic weapons, is expected to say on Thursday that it will not meet forecasts for full-year profits, The Sunday Times reports. Investors had expected Serco to report full-year profits of about GBP326 million this year. Analysts now think it will be about GBP10 million less, with a possible greater impact — up to GBP40 million — next year, the paper says.

Redrow slips 3.3%. Although the company said private reservations for the financial year to date are up 52% on last year, boosted in part by the UK government's Help to Buy mortgage-support programme, the company is one of the biggest fallers on the FTSE 250. Redrow said "whilst the growth in outlets represents good progress, given the size of our land bank it could be better." Due to investment in land, Redrow said net debt increased to around GBP120 million, from GBP91 million at the end of June

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AIM - Winners

Flowgroup is up 23% after it said its compressed air battery technology business has been awarded a three-year framework agreement by National Grid. The developer of alternative energy products said the deal is to replace National Grid's conventional lead-acid backup power units as they reach the end of their service life. The company said the framework agreement is for an initial three-year period which can be extended by up to two additional years. There are 303 National Grid substations in England and Wales, which incorporate 3,200 backup power battery systems.

Tangent Communications is up 20%. The company reported a jump in profits and revenues for the first half of the year and said they're also up on the year so far in the second half, after investments it made in the business last year started to pay off. Tangent launched a restructuring programme last year, closing less-profitable work and focusing on high-margin contracts with big clients in its marketing agencies. Revenues in the six months to end-August rose to GBP13.5 million, from GBP12.1 million, as sales rose strongly in its internet retailing businesses.

Bglobal jumps 12% after it said it was considering the sale of its metering business, B Global Metering Limited, following a strategic review. The company said that it will be re-focusing the business on its customers and imposing strict cash management procedures, including taking significant costs out of its head office. Although the company is contemplating the disposal of its metering business, it said that it will not be selling its software services business, nor will it be seeking an offer for the company as a whole.

Petards jump 8.7% after it was awarded a contract worth over GBP1 million to supply Hyundai Rotem of South Korea with its eyeTrain on-board digital CCTV system for Electrical Multiple Unit trains that Hyundai is supplying to New Zealand. Petards expects to start delivering the CCTV systems in the second half of next year and complete by the end of the year. Petards has won a string of train CCTV system contracts in recent weeks. It won a deal to install CCTV systems on 46 new Alstom trains being built for the Greater Stockholm Local Transport SL in Sweden, just after it won a contract worth over GBP1.75 million to provide on-board digital CCTV systems for Electrostar trains being made by Bombardier for Southern Railway in the UK.

Stellar Diamonds climbs 8.6%. The company said it has renewed its Mandala Mining Licence in south-eastern Guinea for a further five year period. The company said that as part of the renewal process, and in accordance with the mining law, the licence was reduced in area and now covers a total of five kilometres squared. Stellar said it is now considering options to restart production following improvements in rough diamond prices.

Top Level Domain Holdings is up 7.7% after it said that top level domain name .KIWI, owned by its client Dot Kiwi Limited, had passed pre-delegation testing from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the penultimate step towards the domain name going live online.

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

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