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London midday: Merrills takes a shine to banks

Wed, 03rd Feb 2010 12:08

Footsie ended the morning at an intra-day high, driven by a strong performance from financial stocks and miners.Standard Life is the top riser after it announced a 'significant increase' in flows and sales in the fourth quarter. Life and pensions net inflows more than tripled to £1.3bn from £0.4bn a year earlier. Life and pensions sales of £4.2bn were a sizeable improvement on both the prior year (£3.2bn) and the third quarter (£3.0bn).Elsewhere in the financial sector banks are going well after an upbeat note on the UK lenders from Merrill Lynch. The US broker thinks the bad debt picture was at its worst in 2009 while 'funding markets can continue to improve.' Royal Bank of Scotland has had its 'buy' rating restored by Merrill Lynch, with a price target of 45p. The bank is 'one of the European banks that is most geared to a recovery in the global economy and credit markets.' Fellow part-nationalised lender Lloyds Banking is also upgraded to 'buy', as is Barclays, with the former sporting a price target of 80p and the latter a target of 415p. Not to feel left out, HSBC and Standard Chartered are also rated as buys, with the former also benefiting from an 'outperform' rating issued by Credit Suisse.Away from the financials the miners are having a good day, with Vedanta, Xstrata and Kazakhmys leading the sector higher.Mining giant Eurasian Natural Resources (ENRC) said production volumes in the three month ended 31 December further improved on the levels of the previous quarter, in line with expectations. Ferrochrome production increased 56.7% compared to last year and 5.7% from the previous quarter. Iron ore extraction was up 74.1% year-on-year, while saleable ore jumped 79.5%.Copper miner Antofagasta produced 442,500 tonnes of the red metal in 2009, ahead of its original forecast of 433,000 tonnes but lower than the 477,700 tonnes mined during the previous year. The lower production was mainly due to a reduction in output from its Los Pelambres mine in Chile.Also on the upturn is data search software Autonomy, which reported fourth quarter and full year figures that were in line with expectations. Of more interest to the market was a statement of confidence about the outlook for 2010. Revenues for the fourth quarter rose 53% to $223.1m, while adjusted net profits were $80.5m compared with $53.5m last year.Shares in AstraZeneca have fallen back after Morgan Stanley said it is pessimistic about data from trials of the drug group's lung cancer treatment Recentin. 'While consensus expectations are low, we anticipate that potential negative data from the HORIZON III phase III data could still lead to near term weakness,' the broker said.Power supplier Scottish & Southern Energy is on course for a 'moderate increase' in underlying profits this year, while the dividend for the year will be at least 70p, a 6% hike. Over the nine months to December the number of electricity and gas supply customer accounts in the Great Britain market increased by 200,000 to 9.2m. Hot on the heels of Tuesday's engine order from Sichuan Airlines, Rolls-Royce has announced another engine order, this time from Turkish Airlines. The contract is worth up to $170m to Rolls-Royce.Educational and financial information publisher Pearson, which owns the FT, has snapped up Medley Global Advisors, a company that provides macro intelligence to the world's leading investment banks, hedge funds and asset managers. In the mid-cap index, online gaming group PartyGaming is in demand but carpet retailer Carpetright falls back.PartyGaming, which owns the PartyPoker.com online gambling site, said fourth quarter sales surged 32% from the year before and it remains confident about the full year outlook.Carpetright reported sales overall rose by 7% recently despite problems with cold weather. UK and Ireland were the star turns with the sales in the 13 weeks to January up 7.7%, with like-for-like sales up 2.3%. A net four stores opened, increasing the total to 5,942.The share price of Supercart has virtually halved since early October but the shares rallied today after the shopping trolley maker received a £480,000 order from Toys 'R' Us. Contract news was also driving up up the price of recycling container supplier Straight, which bagged a multi-million pound container contract with local government purchasing agencies.Environmentally friendly crop productivity firm Plant Impact said its nitrogen release technology, known as PiNT, has produced positive results in US Department of Agriculture studies.FTSE 100 - RisersStandard Life (SL.) 205.10p +3.74%Barclays (BARC) 299.00p +3.23%London Stock Exchange Group (LSE) 668.50p +3.00%Autonomy Corporation (AU.) 1,612.00p +2.74%Inmarsat (ISAT) 726.00p +2.69%Vedanta Resources (VED) 2,660.00p +2.47%Lloyds Banking Group (LLOY) 55.55p +2.40%FTSE 100 - FallersAstraZeneca (AZN) 2,836.50p -3.22%BAE Systems (BA.) 340.10p -2.02%TUI Travel (TT.) 265.30p -1.38%Diageo (DGE) 1,049.00p -1.22%Cobham (COB) 233.50p -1.18%Whitbread (WTB) 1,426.00p -1.18%Schroders NV (SDRC) 989.50p -1.15%
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25 Mar 2011 17:19

London close: Footsie back at 5,900

Blue chips closed the week just above 5,900 with decent gains across a range of sectors helped by a smattering of broker recommendations. Reckitt Benckiser is wanted after Bank of America Merrill Lynch upgraded the stock of the Cillit Bang maker to "buy" from "neutral", while Autonomy is in the red

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25 Mar 2011 15:28

FTSE 250 movers: African Barrick rises on Tanzanian success

African Barrick Gold is a top performer after having further successes with its drilling programme on the Nyanzaga project in Tanzania. Euromoney Institutional Investor, the business publisher and exhibitions organiser, is among the fallers after its pre-close trading update underwhelmed investors.

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25 Mar 2011 14:07

London afternoon: Gaming firms in demand

Leading shares are mixed after the strong opening prompted traders to bank some profits at the end of a week which has seen the top share index advance by around 170 points. Broker commentary is behind the share price movements of the Footsie's best and worst performers. Reckitt Benckiser is wante

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4 Mar 2011 06:43

Friday tips round-up: Cobham, Aviva, Amec...

Yesterday's full-year figures from Cobham have much to recommend them. Underlying pre-tax profits were up by a healthy 4% to £306m, on revenues broadly flat at £1.9bn, thanks to an improvement in margins to 18.3%. Cobham is also working hard to insulate itself from the ructions over defence spendin

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3 Mar 2011 16:39

London close: Shares soar on Libya deal hopes

Reports that the Libyan situation might be resolved through mediation rather than violence sent UK shares sharply higher. The Arab League is said to be considering a proposal to end the fighting in Libya sending oil prices higher. Heavy oil users such as airline International Consolidated Airlines

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3 Mar 2011 15:28

FTSE 250 movers: PartyGaming surges as sales rise

Online gambling firm PartyGaming is the best performer on the FTSE 250 after 2010 revenues rose by 15%, after casino games, bingo and sports betting offset weakness from the company's poker operations. Cobham was also higher despite statutory pre-tax profits for 2010 falling to £189m, from £245m, h

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3 Mar 2011 14:33

Revenues soar at PartyGaming

Casino games, bingo and sports betting drove revenues higher at PartyGaming in the year to 31 December, offsetting weakness from the company's poker operations. Revenues rose by 15% from the previous year to €357.3m (£300m) to €310.1m, with casino revenues jumping to €151.4m from €136.3m, bingo rev

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3 Mar 2011 14:13

London afternoon: Footsie cruises towards 6,000

Footsie has 6,000 within its sights once more as stocks bounce back strongly on hopes that the Libyan situation might be resolved. Reports that the Arab League is considering a proposal to end the fighting in Libya have boosted sentiment, and has sent the price of oil into reverse. Heavy oil users

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28 Jan 2011 15:56

FTSE 250 movers: BTG and IG Group on the decline

BTG is on of the heaviest fallers despite yesterday's announcement that the speciality pharmaceuticals developer expects its recurring revenues will grow by £5m following the Biocompatibles acquisition. IG Group is following suit after the its was reported yesterday that the spreadbet firm has one

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17 Dec 2010 08:12

PartyGaming's casino keeps year on track

PartyGaming, the internet gambling firm that's merging with rival bwin, has traded in line with expectations during the fourth quarter, with a stronger casino business offsetting weakness in poker and bingo. The company said trading since the end of September has been "solid" overall, thanks mainly

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15 Nov 2010 08:04

Sportingbet confirms talks

Online bookmaker Sportingbet has confirmed it is in talks about 'potential opportunities', rumoured to be with Swedish rival Unibet in a deal that could be worth up to £600m. "The company confirms that it has had and will continue to have discussions with different parties in relation to a variety

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22 Oct 2010 16:24

London close:Dull end to the week

London has closed lower as Wall Street failed to arouse much enthusiasm and miners fell back with a weak dollar. Talks about currency tensions at this weekend's G20 meeting in Korea are also making traders cautious. Lonmin, Eurasian Natural Resources Corp, Vedanta and Anglo American are lower. Tw

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22 Oct 2010 15:25

London afternoon: Gloomy mood continues

Blue chips are stuck in the red as Wall Street failed to arouse much enthusiasm and miners continue to wallow in negative territory as dollar strength trims commodity prices. US company earnings have been largely well-received, but talks about currency tensions at this weekend's G20 meeting in Kore

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22 Oct 2010 12:54

Broker tips: GSK, PartyGaming, Debenhams

Panmure Gordon has not changed its forecasts for GlaxoSmithKline following third quarter results that failed to rouse much excitement. The drugs firm's results were broadly in line with the broker's expectations reporting revenues of £6.81bn and earnings per share of 28.2p. The broker recently dow

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22 Oct 2010 12:44

Broker snap: Exciting future ahead for PartyGaming

KBC Peel Hunt expects that the completion of PartyGaming's merger with bwin Interactive Entertainment to be one "well worth waiting for". The internet gambling firm's third quarter results were in line with forecasts with revenues at €85.3m. This represented a 6% decline compared with the last quar

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