Vodafone Share News (VOD)

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Wednesday.----------FTSE 100 - WINNERS----------Vodafone Group, up 1.1%. The telecommunications firm was double upgraded to Outperform from Underperform by Macquarie. ----------FTSE 100 - LOSERS----------Kingfisher, down 3.2%. The home improvement retailer posted a sharp fall in annual profit amid a tough year for its French business Castorama. Additionally, Kingfisher said it will start searching for a replacement to Chief Executive Officer Veronique Laury. For the year ended January 31, Kingfisher posted a pretax profit of GBP322 million, less than half the prior year's GBP682 million, mostly due to property-related exceptional items. Underlying pretax profit, before transformation costs, fell 13% to GBP693 million from GBP797 million, broadly in line with analyst consensus which had expected a 14% drop to GBP685 million. In the UK and Ireland like-for-like sales dipped 0.8% to GBP5.06 billion. B&Q UK & Ireland like-for-like sales slipped 3.0%, steeper than last year's 2.8% decline and worse than the 2.6% forecast by analysts. In the rest of the firm's markets, France's like-for-like sales were down 3.7% and those in Poland up 1.7%, broadly in line with consensus. ----------Rio Tinto, down 3.8%, BHP, down 2.2%. Shares in the Anglo-Australian miners were lower after Brazilian miner Vale said on Tuesday it has been authorised to resume activities at the Laranjeiras tailings dam and the Brucutu mine. The ruling was made by the Lower Public Treasury Court of Belo Horizonte. Vale was forced to suspend operations at Brucutu and Laranjeiras in February following the collapse of a Vale dam in Brumadinho in late January, which was collecting waste from an iron ore mine in Minas Gerais state. The disaster left 186 people dead and at least 122 still missing.----------Antofagasta, down 2.5%. HSBC downgraded the Chilean copper miner to Reduce from Hold. On Tuesday, Antofagasta said cost increases hurt its annual earnings which prompted a dividend cut.----------FTSE 250 - WINNERS----------Inmarsat, up 18% at 514.00 pence. The satellite communications firm, after the market close on Tuesday. confirmed it received a takeover offer from a consortium of firms in late January - valuing the company at USD7.21 per share. Shares in Inmarsat closed 1.6% higher at 437.80 pence each, equivalent to USD5.80 per share. With 462.1 million shares in issue, the offer would value the company at around USD2.68 billion. The consortium - Apax Partners, Warburg Pincus International and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board - made the cash offer on January 31. Subsequently, the consortium added the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan Board to the members of potentially interested buyers under the deal. Inmarsat - which was responding to media reports of an offer - also confirmed the proposal was still under discussion with a further announcement to be delivered in due course.----------TI FLuid Systems, up 8.0%. The automotive fluid systems manufacturer said it had a "great year" despite a slight softening in global light vehicle production growth. TI said revenue for 2018 dipped to EUR3.47 billion from EUR3.49 billion the year before, but pretax profit rose to EUR217.1 million from EUR158.0 million. This was helped as the firm incurred fewer finance costs, with net finance expense after exceptional items coming to just EUR64.5 million in 2018 versus EUR115.3 million the year before. Revenue growth at constant currency was 2.0%, or 3.1% ahead of global light vehicle production growth volumes. TI Fluid Systems proposed a final dividend of 5.94 euro cents per share, taking the total for the year to 8.96 cents.----------FTSE 250 - LOSERS----------Kier Group, down 6.7%. The construction company slashed its interim dividend as profit dived but retained its forecasts despite tough market conditions. For the six months ended December, the firm sank to a GBP35.5 million pretax loss from a GBP34.3 million profit the year prior. This was despite revenue rising 1.4% to GBP2.19 billion from GBP2.16 billion the year before. Profit performance was hurt by a sharp rise in one-off costs to GBP74.5 million from GBP15.1 million the year prior. The costs were primarily due to combined provisions of GBP51.0 million associated with its Broadmoor Hospital project and Environmental Waste contract. In December, Kier targeted a GBP250 million cash raise through a rights issue. In the end, the offer only received a 38% uptake from investors. Net debt fell to GBP180.5 million from GBP238.5 million the year before. Following the rights issue, Kier cut its interim dividend 79% to 4.9 pence per share from 23.0p the year prior. ----------OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS----------Motif Bio, up 13%. The biopharmaceutical company said it has secured a type A meeting with the US Food & Drug Administration to discuss the points raised in relation to a new drug application for iclaprim. Iclaprim was created for the treatment of acute bacterial skin and skin structure infections. In February, the FDA said it could not accept iclaprim in its current form, with further data needed on its risk to the liver before it can be approved. Motif Bio said a meeting is now scheduled to take place on May 3. The company also said it needs to raise additional capital in the near term and intends to update the market in "due course".----------OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS----------cloudBuy, down 38%. The cloud solutions provider reported a slight reduction in its annual loss, though revenue slipped 26%. Furthermore, the company said of two previously-disclosed funding opportunities, one is now "unlikely". The other option, however, is still viewed as having a "good likelihood of success". If agreed, the funding will enable cloudBuy to reach cash flow breakeven. For 2018, the cloud solutions provider posted a pretax loss of GBP2.3 million compared to GBP2.7 million a year ago as cost reductions offset the revenue fall. Revenue dropped to GBP1.1 million from GBP1.5 million a year ago. The reduction in revenue was mainly due to a number of existing customers not renewing their contracts in 2017 and 2018. Administrative expenses were cut to GBP2.6 million from GBP3.5 million a year ago, while share-based payments amounted to GBP72,495 from GBP164,352.----------