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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Hikma Pharmaceuticals, up 6.4%. The drugmaker was regaining some ground after it closed down 17% on Thursday. Late Wednesday, Hikma had said it expects full-year operating profit within its Generics division to be hit by changes in revenue mix, but maintained its guidance on its other two divisions. Hikma was also downgraded on Friday by S&P Global to Hold from Buy, having been downgraded by both Citigroup and Numis on Thursday.
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FTSE 100 - LOSERS
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Royal Bank of Scotland, down 4.6%. The state-owned lender said it has ditched plans to spin-off its Williams & Glyn business and warned it may prove "more challenging" to meet the bank's targets for 2019. RBS said that due to the complexities involved in separating Williams & Glyn, the risks and costs inherent in the spin-off are such that "it would not be prudent to continue with this programme." It will instead look to sell the business. RBS also warned Brexit has created "considerable uncertainty in our core market". With economic growth weak and interest rates also low, the latter exacerbated by the cut to the UK interest rate announced by the Bank of England on Thursday, RBS said hitting its cost-to-income ratio and return targets by 2019 will likely prove "more challenging". This came as it made an operating loss of GBP274.0 million in the half to the end of June, swung from a GBP261.0 million profit a year prior.
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FTSE 250 - WINNERS
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Ibstock, up 7.9%. The clay bricks maker said it has contingency plans in place to enable it to balance production with sales volumes for the remainder of the year as a response to the uncertainty resulting from the UK's vote to leave the EU. The building materials company said its key focus under these plans will be the management of stock levels and said capacity will be flexed to balance production with sales levels as necessary. Ibstock said it will manage its cost base in response to the evolution of its markets as visibility improves.
Bellway, up 5.0%. The housebuilder said trading in recent weeks since the UK voted to leave the European Union had been encouraging, and said it expects to post a rise in revenue for its financial year. Bellway said it expects to report revenue of GBP2.20 billion for the year ended July 31, up 27% from the GBP1.74 billion recorded a year earlier, on the back of a 13% rise in housing completions to 8,721 and a 13% rise in average selling price to GBP252,700. Bellway's upbeat statement helped blue-chip housebuilders, with Berkeley Group Holdings, Persimmon, Taylor Wimpey and Barratt Developments all among the best performers in the FTSE 100.
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FTSE 250 - LOSERS
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Esure Group, down 4.6%. The insurer trimmed its interim dividend, saying it wanted to retain capital in order to fund its growth plans, as pretax profit sank on one-off costs but underlying profit also was marginally lower. The mid-cap firm, which provides general insurance and owns price comparison service GoCompare, declared a 3.0 pence interim dividend, down from 4.2p a year earlier. Pretax profit for the half-year to the end of June was GBP30.7 million, down 69% from GBP97.6 million a year earlier. Underlying pretax profit, taking out the one-off effects, was essentially flat in the first half, at GBP45.6 million versus GBP46.5 million a year prior.
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MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS
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Petro Matad, up 91%. The oil and gas firm said it will receive a USD10.0 million contractual exit fee from a Royal Dutch Shell affiliate company after Shell decided to exit the Block IV and V production sharing contracts in Mongolia, plus a potential further payment of USD5.0 million. Petro Matad said an agreement had been reached by both parties, with BG Mongolian agreeing to pay the exit fee, as well as a further USD5.0 million should Central Asian Petroleum be unable to secure a partner for any of the two blocks during the exploration period or any extension of the exploration period. If Central Asian Petroleum does find a partner, the USD5.0 million will be refundable to BG Mongolian.
Blue Prism Group, up 18%. The software firm, which designs 'Software Robots' which can be trained to take on routine back-office clerical tasks for businesses, said it anticipates it will outperform its expectations for its current financial year amid good momentum on new contract wins. The company said it has won a number of new contracts, including deploying its Robotic Process Automation software with an unnamed global bank. It also secured a renewal of an existing contract in place with a UK-based global bank, also unnamed. The renewals leave Blue Prism on track to outpace its expectations for its financial year to the end of October.
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Blenheim Natural Resources, up 17%. The natural resources investment company said it has made a further investment in International Geoscience Services for GBP120,000. Blenheim bought 120,000 shares at 100 pence each, as part of a placing by IGS to its existing shareholders. This increases Blenheim's stake in IGS to 30% from 27%. Blenheim said IGS plans to use the proceeds of its placing to advance the development of its artificial intelligence software Xplore.
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MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS
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Grafenia, down 15%. The printing software company said it has seen a drop in sales following the European Union referendum in the UK and is cautious on its outlook for the remainder of its financial year. Grafenia, when reporting its annual results in June, said trading conditions were challenging but were ahead year-on-year. Since then and after the Brexit vote, sales have fallen across the company's business channels. While the company anticipates lower sales in the summer due to the seasonality of its business, it said sales in July missed its expectations. "It is difficult to forecast whether current short-term economic uncertainty will continue into our busiest months in the second half, and we therefore remain cautious on the outlook," the company said.
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By Sam Unsted; samunsted@alliancenews.com; @SamUAtAlliance
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