(Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Thursday.
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FTSE 100 - WINNERS
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ITV, up 2.2%. Exane BNP raised the broadcaster to Outperform from Neutral.
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FTSE 100 - LOSERS
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M&G, down 3.8%. Shares in the investment manager continued to fall after it said on Wednesday that it temporarily suspended trading in shares of its property portfolio fund with immediate effect due to "unusually high" outflows. The firm, fresh from its October demerger from Prudential, said it has been "difficult" for the company to sell property and has turned to a suspension to protect its customers' funds.
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DS Smith, down 3.0%. The packaging firm reported an adjusted operating profit of GBP351 million, up 15% year-on-year but below Irish broker Davy's forecast of GBP383 million. Stripping out the Europac acquisition implies underlying profit of GBP288 million, down 6% year-on-year. The FTSE 100-listed company agreed to buy Spain-based Europac for GBP1.45 billion in June last year, with the deal completing at the start of 2019. The main cause of the profit miss was a lower-than-expected contribution from Europac of GBP63 million, versus Davy's forecast of GBP78 million. More positively, DS Smith said pretax profit grew by 31% in the six months to the end of October to GBP213 million, as revenue climbed by 3.9% to GBP3.19 billion. On a constant currency basis, revenue increased by 3%.
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TUI, down 2.2%. Commerzbank cut the Anglo-German travel operator to Hold from Buy.
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Severn Trent, down 2.0%. Exane BNP downgraded the water company to Underperform from Neutral.
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FTSE 250 - WINNERS
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Dunelm Group, up 18%. The homewares retailer confirmed the "successful" transition of all of its customers to a new digital platform and said it now expects annual profit to beat its previous forecasts. Dunelm said gross margins have been stronger than expected in the first half of its current financial year as a result of sourcing gains and better sell through. Meanwhile, operational costs remain well controlled and in line with the company's expectations, it said. Dunelm said it now has a modern, flexible, cloud-native platform that will be used to accelerate the development of its customer proposition. As a result, Dunelm now anticipates that the pretax profit for the year to the end of June will be higher than its previous expectations. For its financial year ended June 29, pretax profit jumped 35% to GBP125.9 million on a 4.8% rise in revenue to GBP1.10 billion. In addition, Peel Hunt raised the stock to Buy from Add.
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FTSE 250 - LOSERS
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Stagecoach Group, down 4.5%. Liberum cut the transport company to Hold from Buy.
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IG Group, down 3.4%. The online trading company said its revenue slipped in the first half of its current financial year due to new European regulations. The provider of trading in contracts for difference and financial spread betting said it expects net trading revenue in the six months to the end of November to come in at around GBP250 million compared to the GBP251 million it reported a year prior. The company noted that it has continued to build the size and quality of the active client base in its core markets, which is the key driver of revenue growth in the medium-term. IG Group said revenue in its core markets in the first half is expected to be around GBP210 million, 6% lower than in the same period of the year before.
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Hochschild Mining, down 3.5%. UBS cut the gold miner to Neutral from Buy.
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OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS
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boohoo Group, down 4.7% at 283.00 pence. The online fashion retailer's founders Mahmud Kamani and Carol Kane sold a combined total of 50 million shares via an accelerated share bookbuild, placing managers Zeus Capital and Jefferies International said late Wednesday. This represents a 4.3% stake in the company. The shares were sold at 285p each, with the stock closing at 297.10p on Wednesday.
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By Arvind Bhunjun; arvindbhunjun@alliancenews.com
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