London afternoon: Bid activity keeps the pot bubbling

A sprinkling of bid speculation is livening up markets this Monday, as traders wait for the Irish sovereign debt situation to play itself out. Shares in Invensys are higher despite the engineering firm denying press reports that it has received an approach. The company's chief executive Ulf Henriksson told the Telegraph that China Southern Rail has agreed in principle the possibility of acquiring Invensys, but no "discussions regarding a possible offer for the company or about a strategic partner taking a minority stake" have taken place.Premier Oil is doing its bit for the mid-cap index, racing to a new all-time high on talk that state-controlled KNOC, the Koreans who recently paid £1.9bn for Dana Petroleum, also have the North Sea oil giant in their sights.The UK company, sitting on a massive find in the Catcher field, has apparently denied the rumour, but its oil would go some way to helping Korean politicians achieve their target of doubling production by 2012.It expects to produce 44,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boepd) this year and about 75,000 boepd in 2012.It is lagging behind fellow FTSE 250 stock Sportingbet, however. The online bookmaker Sportingbet has confirmed it is in merger talks, rumoured to be with Swedish rival Unibet in a deal that could be worth up to £600m.Underwriter Beazley has again been rejected by rival Hardy despite upping its indicative takeover offer by 10% to 330p. Beazley said the board of Hardy would not recommend an offer of 330p per share and would not even be prepared to meet to discuss it. A previous offer of 300p per share got similar short-shrift.Back among the blue-chips, platinum miner Lonmin is as good as gold, after it bounced back into profit and recommenced dividend payments, as higher metals prices offset the ongoing technical problems at its main furnace. Profits in the year to September came in at $240m, compared to a loss of $272m last time. Revenues rose from $1.06bn to $1.59bn. A final dividend of 15c is proposed.BHP Billiton is higher after its decision to end its battle to buy Canada's Potash Corp for around $40bn and sweeten shareholders with a $4.2bn share buyback instead.Earlier this month, Canadian Minister of Industry Tony Clement said he wasn't satisfied the offer for the world's largest fertiliser maker was likely to be of net benefit to Canada and gave the company 30 days to prove otherwise. Today, BHP decided it couldn't satisfy the politicians and has withdrawn the offer, but not before racking up $350m worth of costs.The trimming of the BP empire continued Monday morning with the oil giant completing the sale of five southern African marketing businesses. The company has agreed to sell its fuels marketing businesses in Namibia, Botswana and Zambia to Swiss company Puma Energy, a subsidiary of Trafigura Beheer. Fellow oil firm Tullow Oil is wanted after a favourable result on its 10% owned Mercury-1 exploration well in Sierra Leone.Serco, the outsourcing company that recently got a telling off for asking suppliers to subsidise the group's contribution to the government's spending cuts, is on track to deliver on its financial guidance for 2010. At the half year Serco had an order book of £16.7bn, since when it has been awarded £2.3bn of contracts, bringing the total for the year to date to £4.5bn, comprising signed contracts valued at £3.7bn and preferred bidder appointments valued at £0.8bn.Telecoms giant Vodafone has been ordered to pay $550m (£340m) as a deposit against a possible $2.5bn tax bill in India. Vodafone has been given a 30-day deadline to pay the full tax bill, which relates to an acquisition three years ago, but the mobile giant is vigorously disputing the bill.Autumn did not bring the usual increase in visitor numbers for Persimmon but the housebuilder said sales volumes have remained stable in the second half of the year. The company reiterated its previous guidance of an increase in full year sales revenues of around 10% more than last year, but said total borrowings at the end of the year are expected to be less than £80m, lower than previous guidance.The stock performs better than many of its peers such as Taylor Wimpey, Berkeley Group and Barratt Developments after a report from Rightmove, the property listings web site, reported that asking prices for houses fell by 3.2% in the four weeks to 6 November. Pork specialist Cranswick served up a 12% increase in half year pre-tax profit, hiked its dividend and said it was confident for the second half. Pre-tax profit rose to £23.8m in the six months ended 30 September 2010 from £21.3m in 2009 following increased demand for its pork products. Turnover for the period rose 8% to £384.3m. Shares in Noventa fell back after the tantalum miner said that initial sampling results from its Marropino South project in Mozambique demonstrated a lack of consistency in grades recovered.