WINNERS & LOSERS: Mondi Shares Surge As Profits Rise

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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Mondi, up 11%. The paper company reported a 29% increase in operating profit excluding exceptional items in the first quarter of 2015, driven by higher volumes and lower input costs across most of Europe, strong contributions from capital projects and acquisitions, and higher selling prices in Russia and South Africa. It said its underlying operating profit in the three months to end-March, which excludes what it terms as special items, was EUR236 million, up from EUR183 million a year earlier, and up 9% from EUR216 million in the fourth quarter of 2014.

Barratt Developments, up 3.5%. The housebuilder said it remains on track to report a significant improvement in its results in the year to end-June, as it expects housing completions to be ahead of previous guidance and as it reported a 17.9% increase in total forward sales by May 10. It said it now expects housing completions for the year to June 30 to be about 16,100, up from 14,838 in its last financial year, and it said forward sales including joint ventures stood at GBP2.59 billion as of May 10, up from GBP2.20 billion on May 11, 2014.

SABMiller, up 2.2%. The brewer reported flat pretax profit in its recently-ended financial year and a slight fall in revenue as it was hit by currency exchange rate changes and booked costs associated with joint ventures and acquisitions. However, the company said it will pay a full-year dividend of 113.0 cents, up 8% on the year before, as it said it was on track to hit its USD500 million savings target by the year that ends in March 2018.

TUI Group, up 1.9%. The travel company said its operating loss narrowed in the first half of its financial year, as revenue rose and its hotels and resorts and cruises businesses delivered a significant increase in profitability, and it retained its profit guidance for the year as a whole. TUI reported a loss before interest, tax and amortisation of EUR292.0 million for the six months to end-March, compared with EUR341.4 million a year earlier, when profits on asset sales and a refinancing benefit are excluded.
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FTSE 100 LOSERS
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Compass Group, down 3.2%. The catering company reported a rise in profit in the first half of its financial year, boosted by strong sales in North America and the emerging markets. It reported a 4.9% rise in pretax profit for the six months to March 31 to GBP621 million, while its organic revenue grew 5.7% to GBP8.9 billion. However, Chief Executive Richard Cousins warned about the economic environment in some of its emerging markets.

Admiral Group, down 1.6%. The motor insurer said Chief Executive Henry Engelhardt is to step down from the role in one year's time and will be replaced by company co-founder and current chief operating officer David Stevens. Engelhardt has been the chief executive of Admiral since its founding in June 1991. Stevens also has been with the company throughout its history and, in addition to the COO role, is the chief executive of the UK insurance business.

EasyJet, down 0.2%. Numis downgrades easyJet to Add from Buy, cutting its price target to 1,850 pence from 2,100p, following a sharp decrease in the low-cost airline's share price Tuesday after it gave a weak outlook for the second half of its financial year. The budget airline currently trades at 1,651.26p.
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FTSE 250 WINNERS
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Premier Oil, up 4.7%. The oil and gas explorer and producer said production was ahead of the company's guidance despite falling across all of its portfolio except Vietnam in the first quarter, but it reiterated its full-year guidance and said it will focus on reducing costs for the rest of the year. Premier said production averaged 60,200 barrels of oil equivalent per day in the first quarter of 2015, down from 65,800 barrels per day a year earlier. The fall was due to the sale of the Scott area in the UK North Sea and some natural decline across the portfolio.

Renishaw, up 2.8%. The engineering company said its revenue and pretax profit surged higher in the third quarter and the first nine months of the year, with growth across its regional operations particularly in the Far East. Renishaw said revenue in the third quarter to the end of March was GBP145.9 million, up from GBP84.5 million a year earlier, driving its third quarter pretax profit up to GBP53.2 million from GBP14.4 million and its nine-month pretax profit up to GBP109.8 million from GBP40 million.

Centamin, up 2.6%. The miner reported a year-on-year rise in revenue, earnings, pretax profit and production in the first quarter of 2015, although all the measures were down quarter-on-quarter. The company reported a pretax profit of USD28.6 million in the three months to end-March, up from USD20.6 million a year earlier, whilst earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation came in at USD53.0 million, up 55% from a year earlier when earnings totalled USD34.3 million. Basic earnings per share in the period was 2.50 cents, rising from 1.87 cents in the first quarter of 2014.
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FTSE 250 LOSERS
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Mitie Group, down 2.9%. The chief executive of the outsourcer is set to meet with UK government officials to respond to claims the company has not been paying the minimum wage to care home workers in England, the BBC reported Wednesday. The BBC and investigative group Corporate Watch in March found Mitie's MiHomecare business was not paying the minimum wage to home care workers at two branches in Wales.

Saga, down 1.0%. The provider of travel and financial products' majority investors sold a larger-than-expected stake in the company, raising a total of GBP239 million. The three private equity companies that listed Saga sold a further 122.5 million shares, or around an 11% stake, in the company for 195 pence per share. On Tuesday, the investors had said they would sell a minimum of 77 million shares in the company in a secondary placing. Saga shares currently trade at 197.00p.
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AIM ALL-SHARE WINNERS
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Synectics, up 19%. The surveillance systems company said it has secured a multi-million pound contract extension in the far east. The company has been awarded a contract to significantly expand its surveillance, recording and control room service to an existing client. The project is the second phase of a major phase of work for the unnamed customer, which operates in the gaming industry, and is expected to be completed in the current financial year.

Environmental Recycling Technologies, up 11%. The company said it has signed an agreement with thermal equipment company CDS Group to supply powder impression moulding manufacturing equipment. Under the deal, CDS will be the supplier of complete modular and scalable plants for the manufacturing of powder impression moulding products.
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By Neil Thakrar; neilthakrar@alliancenews.com; @NeilThakrar1

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