UK WINNERS & LOSERS SUMMARY: Amigo Rises 18% Amid Battle With Founder

Fri, 28th Aug 2020 11:09

(Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Friday.

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FTSE 100 - WINNERS

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Polymetal International up 3.0%, Fresnillo, up 2.5%. The gold miners were tracking spot gold prices higher, as the dollar weakened after dovish comments from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Thursday. Gold was quoted at USD1,955.71 an ounce Friday morning, up from USD1,919.95 late Thursday. "With the US election approaching, a new Fed policy framework explicitly allows for inflation to moderately overshoot the 2% target to catch-up on previous undershooting, and with very depressed US real interest rates, some long-term investors will likely continue to want to diversify away from the greenback. So gold should remain bid on dips through to the [Federal Open Market Committee] actionable meeting in September," said AxiCorp's Stephen Innes.

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FTSE 100 - LOSERS

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Rolls-Royce, down 3.3%. The jet engine maker was extending losses from Thursday. The stock closed down 1.2% on Thursday after Rolls-Royce said it was looking to sell assets, amid a gaping loss and a warning of "material uncertainties" caused by the coronavirus pandemic. "Rolls-Royce continued its descent, falling another 3.4% after yesterday's disappointing results and heightened speculation that the company will have to do a discounted equity placing to raise money to strengthen its balance sheet," said AJ Bell's Russ Mould.

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FTSE 250 - WINNERS

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John Wood, up 4.2% at 242.90 pence. Barclays raised its price target on the oilfield services company to 330 pence from 300p and reiterated its Overweight rating.

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OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS

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Amigo Holdings, up 18%. The guarantor loans provider posted a sharp drop in first-quarter earnings after granting payment holidays to borrowers, just one day after its disgruntled founder made his formal bid to return. For the first quarter ended June 30, revenue was down 32% to GBP48.8 million from GBP71.5 million in the first quarter last year, and pretax profit tumbled to GBP1.4 million from GBP22.6 million. The struggling lender is in a battle over its future with founder James Benamor. After the London market close on Thursday, Amigo had said it received a general meeting requisition notice from Benamor's Richmond Group for appointing Benamor as a director of the company. The notice also proposed removal of Chief Financial Officer Nayan Kisnadwala, Interim Chair Roger Lovering and Chief Executive Glen Crawford as directors of Amigo and resolutions in relation to Amigo's unit Amigo Loans. Amigo later Friday said Richmond had withdrawn the resolution to remove Crawford.

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Frontier Developments, up 8.2%. The video game developer said it expects revenue for its current financial year to be at the top half of consensus expectations. Frontier Developments said that, for the year to the end of May, it is well placed, with sales across all its games for the year-to-date being consistent with expectations. Considering the group's actual performance, and projections for the financial year as a whole, revenue is expected to be within the top half of consensus expectations, which is between GBP83 million and GBP95 million. For the year before, Frontier Developments recorded revenue at GBP89.7 million.

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OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS

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Benchmark Holdings, down 1.5%. The aquaculture genetics and nutrition company reported a narrowed loss in the third quarter of its financial year, as revenue grew amid a good performance in Genetics and Advanced Nutrition. For the three months to the end of June, the firm reported a pretax loss of GBP4.4 million, narrowed from GBP12.5 million the same period the year before. For the year to date, Benchmark's pretax loss widened to GBP23.2 million from GBP21.6 million, while revenue declined by 9.4% to GBP81.6 million from GBP90.1 million, as a result of the continued effects of weak shrimp markets and an oversupply of Artemia in its Advanced Nutrition business reported in the first half of the group's financial year. Looking ahead, Benchmark said the salmon industry remains resilient and the sea bass/bream markets stable; however, the shrimp market remains challenging, and the group expect these trends to continue in the current financial year.

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By Arvind Bhunjun; arvindbhunjun@alliancenews.com