WINNERS & LOSERS: Berkeley Group, Like Peers, Posts Strong Earnings

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are amongst the biggest risers and fallers within the main London indices midday Wednesday.
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FTSE 100 WINNERS
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Whitbread, up 0.7%. Morgan Stanley has upgraded the hotels and coffee chain operator to Overweight from Equal Weight.
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FTSE 100 LOSERS
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Tesco, down 1.4%. Credit Suisse has initiated coverage of the supermarket at Underperform.
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FTSE 250 WINNERS
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Berkeley Group Holdings, up 8.2%. The housebuilder joined its peers in reporting higher profit and revenue for its last financial year as its average selling prices rose strongly and it booked gains on land and asset sales, and it said the clear UK election result had underpinned its outlook. The company reported a pretax profit of GBP539.7 million for the year to April 30, up from GBP380.0 million a year before, as revenue grew to GBP2.12 billion, from GBP1.62 billion.

Ocado Group, up 1.3%. Credit Suisse has initiated the online grocery company at Outperform.
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FTSE 250 LOSERS
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Just Eat, down 4.6%. Morgan Stanley initiates the online takeaway platform at Equal Weight.

Betfair Group, down 3.1%. The online gaming company reported growth in pretax profit in its recently-ended financial year as a rise in customer numbers led to double-digit sales growth in all three of its divisions. It posted a pretax profit of GBP101.2 million in the year to April 30 from GBP61.1 million the year before, as revenue rose 21% to GBP476.5 million from GBP393.6 million. However, Panmure Gordon cut the company to Hold from Buy, as the broker feels revenue growth will be slow moving forward, while competition will increase due to reduced industry profit margins caused by the UK point of consumption tax.
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AIM ALL-SHARE WINNERS
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Cap-XX, up 21%. The company said it was "very encouraged" by initial industry feedback for its recently launched range of Thinline supercapacitors, after it shipped sample units for evaluation to manufacturers of wearable devices, energy harvesters and smart credit cards.

Goldplat, up 14%. The company said it has made "significant progress" at its gold recovery businesses in South Africa and Ghana and said the backlog of material caused by problems with its refining partner, Rand Refinery, will be cleared by the end of 2015 as a result.

Tertiary Minerals, up 9.5%. The mineral developer announced a 67% increase in its total mineral resource estimate for its MB Flourspar project in Nevada following a drilling programme at the site and said it thinks the deposit size will far exceed current estimates.

Active Energy Group, up 6.8%. The company said it has received written confirmation from the Canadian Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs that the report regarding a possible breach of law by its joint venture operation in Alberta will be issued in the next four weeks.
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AIM ALL-SHARE LOSERS
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Sefton Resources, off 43%. The company raised GBP799,500 gross by placing 1.23 million shares at a discounted 0.065 pence a share. It also issued 615 million warrants to subscribe for shares at the same price. The company confirmed that the new placing proceeds will be used to accelerate the its objective of acquiring interests in new production, development and/or exploration assets with use of proceeds being to continue to undertake further due diligence on certain assets. The company's shares currently trade at 0.08p.

Baron Oil, down 11%. The Latin American focused oil company reported a wider pretax loss in 2014 as costs outstripped revenue and it booked numerous impairments, but said it is expecting "positive results" in 2015 after a "challenging year".
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By Neil Thakrar; neilthakrar@alliancenews.com; @NeilThakrar1

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