Sophos Group Share News (SOPH)

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Friday.----------FTSE 100 - LOSERS----------easyJet, down 1.4%. JPMorgan has cut its rating for the stock to Neutral from Overweight. ----------FTSE 250 - WINNERS----------Greencoat UK Wind, up 2.4%. The investor upped its annual payout following an increase in net asset value per share over 2018. The mid-cap company, which invests in UK wind farms, reported NAV of GBP1.39 billion as at December 31, or 123.1 pence per share. As at the end of 2017, Greencoat's NAV was GBP1.14 billion, or 111.2p a share. Greencoat declared a dividend of 1.69p per share for the final quarter of 2018, taking the total payout for the year to 6.76p per share, up from 6.49p paid the year prior. For 2019, the company is targeting a dividend of 6.94p per share. During the quarter, Greencoat said power generation was on budget and power prices were above budget, while generation for the full year was 6% below budget, due to low wind resource. Cash generation for 2018 was on budget owing to higher power prices, the company noted.----------FTSE 250 - LOSERS----------Sophos, down 20%. The IT firm reported a "subdued billings performance" for the third quarter of its financial year, which is expected to continue into the final quarter. For the three months to the end of December, billings dipped by 0.6% to USD193.7 million from USD194.0 million. For the nine-month period, billings increased slightly by 1.9% to USD546.4 million from USD536.3 million. Sophos attributed the subdued performance to a "modest decline" in billings from new customers, and a decline in hardware billings. This led to earnings before interest, taxes, deprecation and amortisation declining by 8.3% for the nine-month period to USD103.9 million from USD113.3 million. The group expects third quarter trends to continue into the final quarter of its financial year, which would lead to a modest decline in constant currency billings.----------OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS----------Ironveld, up 35%. The miner anticipates reaching a long-term agreement with a potential off-take partner in the next three weeks, as it has delivered ore samples from its South African project for testing. At the end of September, Ironveld began supplying 10,000 tons of ore to an undisclosed company, which is a unit of an international steel group. Ironveld has now delivered sufficient tonnage to the potential off-taker for the potential client to undertake a full kiln smelting test and expects to receive the outcome of the test in the next three weeks. Upon completion, Ironveld anticipates that a long term agreement with the off-take partner will be reached. ----------LoopUp, up 7.8%. The remote meetings firm announced a "material" contract renewal with law firm Clifford Chance. The contract is worth GBP2.3 million and will last for three years. LoopUp will provide conference calls across Clifford Chance's global operations, which span 32 "major" financial centres around the world. LoopUp said its services are normally pay-as-you-go, but Clifford Chance agreed to a guaranteed minimum spend, which LoopUp said "is a mark of their commitment to the group's differentiated product over the long-term".----------OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS----------Record, down 9.5%. The currency manager reported a 6.5% drop in assets under management equivalents in the third quarter due to the termination of a previously announced mandate and movements in global stock markets and currency exchange rates. The company's assets under management equivalents as at December 31 totalled USD57.8 billion, down from USD61.8 billion on September 30. In sterling terms, assets fell to GBP45.4 billion from GBP47.4 billion. Record had 65 clients at period end, down 1 from 66 at the start of the period. Movements in global equities and other markets dented the company's assets under management equivalents by USD2.0 billion, while currency exchange rate movements and mandate volatility shaved off USD900 million.----------