Paddy Power Betfair Share News (PPB)

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Friday.
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FTSE 100 - WINNERS
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Paddy Power Betfair, up 3.5%. The bookmaker increased its earnings guidance for 2016 thanks to robust trading results and as it delivers synergies from its merger faster than envisaged. The company said it now expects its pro-forma underlying earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation for 2016 to be between GBP390.0 million and GBP405.0 million, up from its previous guidance of GBP365.0 million to GBP385.0 million. Paddy Power Betfair said the majority of the work targeted to deliver GBP65.0 million in annual synergy savings from the merger of Paddy Power and Betfair, which created the current company, have been completed and integration work is tracking ahead of plan. Davy analysts said Paddy Power Betfair's performance is the beginning of an "extended upgrade cycle" for the company.

Rolls Royce Holdings, up 0.5%, BAE Systems, up 0.1%. The two aerospace stocks were upgraded to Buy by Citigroup.
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FTSE 100 - LOSERS
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International Consolidated Airlines Group, down 3.5%. The British Airways parent company said group traffic and capacity both increased during October, but load factor dipped, as the airline group adjusted some of its long-term goals that it hopes to achieve by 2020. IAG said traffic in October across the group, measured in revenue passenger kilometres, increased by 3.1% compared to the previous year. However, group load factor slipped to 82.0% in October from 83.4% a year before.

easyJet, down 2.4%. The low-cost carrier said it also carried more passengers year-on-year in October but its load factor also slipped considerably. The company said it carried 6.8 million passengers in October, compared to 6.4 million a year earlier, up 6.9%. But easyJet said its load factor declined 3.1 percentage points in October to 90.2% from 93.3%. On the rolling 12-month measure, its load factor dipped to 91.3% from 91.7%.

Persimmon, down 3.5%, Berkeley Group Holdings, down 3.3%, Taylor Wimpey, down 3.0%, Barratt Developments, down 2.9%. Accendo Markets analyst Mike Van Dulken attributed the housebuilders' decline to several reasons. These include a more balanced outlook from the Bank of England on Thursday alongside UK economic growth holding up surprisingly well. As such the probability of another interest rate cut and more stimulus is reduced. The weak pound also places pressure on first-time buyers and existing homeowners trying to climb the UK property ladder. Furthermore, "yesterday’s High Court ruling...may have increased ever so slightly the chance that Brexit never happens, possibly even delaying PM [Theresa] May's end-March trigger goal. Adding another layer of near-term Brexit uncertainty for consumers and businesses alike is simply something the sector doesn’t need," Van Dulken said.
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FTSE 250 - WINNERS
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Tullett Prebon, up 3.2%. The inter-dealer broker said it has received a significant revenue boost in the third quarter from the depreciation in sterling, and it is continuing to progress its acquisition of the voice-broking business of ICAP. Tullett Prebon said revenue in the three months to September 30 was GBP216 million, up 15% from GBP188 million the previous year. However, the company said in constant exchange rates the growth was just 4%.

Aggreko, up 1.5%. The temporary power generators provider was raised to Equal Weight from Underweight by Morgan Stanley.
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FTSE 250 - LOSERS
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DFS Furniture, down 12% at 231.00 pence. Swiss bank UBS said funds managed by private equity firm Advent International Corp has sold half its stake in sofa retailer via a placing. Advent sold Advent sold 25.7 million DFS shares at 240.00 pence apiece, raising a total of GBP61.7 million. DFS shares closed at 263.70p on Thursday. The sale represents around a 12% stake in DFS and, after the sale, Advent still will managed a stake of around 12% in the company.

Lancashire Holdings, down 3.7%. The specialty insurance company was downgraded to Underweight from Neutral by JP Morgan.
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MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS
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Deltex Medical Group, up 12%. The oesophageal Doppler monitoring probes maker said it has secured a significant account win with an unnamed National Health Service hospital in the south east of England. The company said a 450-bed hospital has acquired six CardioQ-ODM+ in addition to an initial stock of single patient oesophageal probes for use in its peri-operative surgical care. The initial order is worth GBP30,000, and Deltex said the agreement reflects a general improvement in demand from UK hospitals in the second half of 2016.

Tri-Star Resources, up 10%. The miner said progress has been made on the Oman antimony roaster project, with a number of key construction items due to be delivered in the first half of 2017. Tri-Star owns a 40% stake in Strategic & Precious Metals Processing, the company which holds the project. Tri-Star said the design for the project has been enhanced, with the inclusion of a gold recovery stream and increased capacity at the site. The manufacturing of key plant equipment also is underway, and this is expected to be delivered in the first half of 2017, while negotiations with potential concentrate suppliers are also ongoing.

Best of the Best, up 9.9%. The luxury car competitions operator said its profit for the first half of the year was ahead of management expectations, boosted by improving operating margins. Best of the Best said its operating margins have improved, and that its market investment in customer acquisition during the period was "slightly lower than originally anticipated". The company said its revenue for the six-month period was in line with management expectations, with its proportion of sales online increasing.
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MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS
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Cluff Natural Resources, down 22% at 2.85p. The North Sea-focused oil and gas firm said it will raise GBP1.8 million via a discounted placing to provide it with sufficient funding for 2017. Cluff said it will use the funds to work towards its aim of farming down its equity positions in two production licences in the southern North Sea gas basin, in addition to continuing to de-risk other licences in its portfolio. Cluff will raise money via an accelerated bookbuild, to be run by Allenby Capital, and the shares will be issued at 2.50p each. Cluff shares were down 20% after the announcement at 2.93p, having opened at 3.65p. The firm said Algy Cluff, its chairman and chief executive, has signalled he will take part in the subscription.
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By Arvind Bhunjun; arvindbhunjun@alliancenews.com; @ArvindBhunjun

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