UK WINNERS & LOSERS: Hargreaves Continues To Rise, e-Therapeutics Trips

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers on the main London indices Wednesday morning.

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FTSE 100 - Winners

Hargreaves Lansdown, up 2.1%, is the biggest gainer on the blue-chip index. The company's share price continues to gain after it Tuesday said its assets under management rose 38% during its first quarter. Alongside this, first quarter revenue rose 13%, driven by the higher level of Vantage assets under administration compared to the same period in the previous year. It also said that the GBP3 billion Royal Mail flotation, which occurred after the end of the quarter, had resulted in "immense" client participation. Hargreaves Chief Executive Ian Gorham said that although there was interest from existing clients, a "large proportion" of Royal Mail clients were new clients and also new investors, whom he expects Hargreaves to retain. Numis is confident that the company will continue to receive further strong dealing volumes in the second quarter.

IMI, up 1.5%. The company said it would return GBP620 million to shareholders and top up its UK pension scheme after selling its beverage dispensing and merchandising business for USD1.1 billion to The Marmon Group. It expects the deal to complete in the first quarter of 2014. The engineering group also said current trading was meeting its expectations and it is confident it will deliver full-year results that will meet current market expectations. It said revenues in the three months to end-September were up 4% on the year, or 3% excluding acquisitions and exchange rate movements. Revenues are flat so far this year, it added. "Markets have been calling for this for a long time and have got what they wanted", says Jefferies analyst Andy Douglas. The sale figure may be slightly lower than some expected, but as IMI will not be paying tax on the disposal it's a positive deal, explains Douglas. Numis agrees that the deal is a progressive step, leaving IMI focused on its higher-margin flow control business.

Randgold Resources is up 1.4%. Head of Research at Accendo Markets, Michael van Dulken, believes that this can be attributed to a boost in sentiment towards gold as the US moves closer to its borrowing limit.

ITV is up 1.3% following more positive news, says Liberum. As one of the official broadcasters of the 2014 World Cup, England's qualification for the tournament by defeating Poland on Tuesday is likely to ensure that the company achieves Liberum's 5.4% TV advertising growth forecast for 2014. Alongside this, Liberum is encouraged by the news that both Omnicom and Publicis have reported that their third-quarter organic revenue growth in the UK was over 7%, demonstrating that the market is in a strong condition. The brokerage expects ITV's third-quarter TV advertising revenue to grow by 11%-12%.

BT Group, up 0.3%. The telecoms provider has seen share price jump after Goldman Sachs raised it to its Conviction Buy list.

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FTSE 100 - Losers

Burberry Group, down 2.3%, continues its decline, albeit at a slower rate, after the luxury retailer Tuesday announced that CEO Angela Ahrendts will step down and move to a new role at US technology giant Apple. Chief Creative Officer Christopher Bailey will take both roles in mid-2014.

Anglo American, down, 1.5% is falling from highs achieved on Tuesday. The company's share price had been increasing on the news that significant progress has been made on improving it subsidiary Kumba Iron Ore Ltd's Sishen Mine in South Africa, after it relocated the Transnet railway line off the site and bought the land it used to sit on, meaning the mine can operate more effectively.

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FTSE 250 - Winners

Serco Group is up 1% on the back of the news that HSBC has raised its recommendation to Overweight from Neutral, with a price target of 635p.

Bellway, up 0.7%, is one of the biggest winners on the FTSE 250. The housebuilder continues to perform well after it reported a 33.8% increase in profit a for the full year Tuesday, boosted by government mortgage lending schemes. The company's share price has also been helped by Panmure raising its price target to 1466 pence from 1396p, with a Buy recommendation. Similarly, Deutsche Bank has increased its price target to 1592p from 1581p.

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FTSE 250 - Losers

Hochschild Mining, down 3%. Despite announcing that it had increased production across the board in its third quarter, the company also sold less metal during they period. The amount of gold sold fell to 41,430 ounces from 47,950 ounces, while the amount of silver sold fell to 4.7 million ounces from 5.3 million ounces during the period.

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AIM - Winners

Equatorial Palm Oil, up 36%, has jumped following the news that it is in talks with Kuala Lumpur Kepong Berhad about funding its Liberian Palm Developments joint venture, and those talks could also lead to an offer for all or part of the parent company. However, the company did caution that the talks are in early stages and a deal may not emerge.

Thor Mining jumps 23% after it said it has been offered a concentrate off-take agreement by US company Tungsten & Powders Corp. The company said that, subject to due diligence and Thor securing necessary funding, the deal would see Global Tungsten & Powders taking an order of 70%-75% of Thor's annual production of scheelite concentrate from its Molyhill site. Thor Mining said that the deal was made at a market price for scheelite concentrate but didn't disclose financial details. Scheelite concentrate is crystal ore developed from tungsten and is often used for gemstones. The company said that deal would continue over the four-year life of mine and could include a possible two-year extension.

Vertu Motors, up 10%. The company's pretax profit rose by 69% to GBP8.6 million in its recent half year, compared with GBP5.1 million for the corresponding period last year, on the back of increased revenues. The automobile retailer said it expects its full-year results to be "significantly ahead of market expectations" because of its acquisition of Farnell Land Rover. The company also said that strong volume and margins in used cars led to 12% increase in like-for-like gross profit. Liberum is encouraged by Vertu's interim results showing growth in all areas and has initiated coverage of the stock with a Buy rating and a price target of 69p, forecasting a 15% upgrade to consensus forecasts.

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AIM - Losers

e-Therapeutics, down 22%, is the biggest faller on the AIM All-share index. The company said its pretax loss widened in the recent half year as it spent more on research and development. Its pretax loss widened to GBP2.8 million of the six months to July 31, compared with GBP2.2 million for the corresponding period last year. The company spent GBP2.5 million on R&D, a significant increase on last half year's GBP1.6 million.

NEOS Resources falls 13% following the news on Tuesday that its Chief Operations Officer has resigned. The global agricultural product supplier said its Chief Operations Officer Ravi Jose has resigned with immediate effect and the company has taken on Duncan Keil and Gordon Tainton as non-executive directors. NEOS also said that in line with previous statements it is winding down operations in India towards ceasing operations entirely and expects to receive net proceeds from the liquidation of GBP100,000.

Weatherly International is down 8.1% even though it said cash costs in its latest quarter were 13% lower than in the previous three months as it moves forward on an efficiency drive. The mining company said the amount of ore treated increased to 75,060 tonnes from 64,872 tonnes the previous quarter but that its average grade fell to 1.72% from 2.05% and the amount of copper concentrate recovered fell to 5,118 tonnes from 5,250 tonnes. Weatherly said that its unit cash costs for the quarter fell to USD6,096 per tonne and that it is continuing to work towards reducing its unit costs.

Paragon Diamonds dips 5.3% after it said a parcel of sampled stones from the Lemphane Kimberlite Diamond mine has been sold in Antwerp. The Lesotho-focused diamond development and production company said it achieved an average value of USD358 per carat for the combined overall parcel of 221.2 carats. Paragon said the diamond parcel was made up of samples excavated from different locations on the surface of the project and included twelve diamonds in excess of 1.80 carats, including two stones valued at USD2,000 per carat, which represented 63% of the full parcel value.

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By James Kemp; jameskemp@alliancenews.com; @jamespkemp

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