WINNERS & LOSERS SUMMARY: Provident Financial Issues Profit Warning

LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Tuesday.----------FTSE 100 - WINNERS----------BAE Systems, up 1.5%. The defence giant was upgraded to Equal Weight from Underweight by Barclays.----------FTSE 100 - LOSERS----------Persimmon, down 0.7%. Shares in the housebuilder were lower despite delivering a "strong trading performance" during the recently-ended financial year with a 4% rise in revenue. Persimmon expects total revenue for 2018 to come in at GBP3.74 billion, up from GBP3.60 billion a year ago. New housing revenue was predicted to rise by 4% to GBP3.55 billion from GBP3.24 billion, with the company's legal completions increasing by 406 new homes, or 3%, to 16,449 from 16.043. Average selling price increased by 1% year-on-year to GBP215,560. Persimmon now expects 2018 pretax profit to be "modestly ahead of current market consensus" after benefitting from new developments opened during the year. Peers Taylor Wimpey, Barratt Developments and Berkeley Group were down 0.8%, 0.7% and 0.5% respectively. "Our major concern for Persimmon and all the housebuilders is the outcome and the uncertainty over the Brexit situation," said Share Centre analyst Helal Miah. ----------FTSE 250 - WINNERS----------Spirent Communications, up 13%. The telecommunications equipment maker said its order intake and revenue increased in 2018, due to strong growth from its Networks & Security and Positioning segments. Spirent divested one of its businesses in 2017, which contributed USD5.9 million of revenue, USD5.2 million of order intake, and USD1.4 million of adjusted operating profit to the firm's 2017 results. Excluding this divestment, revenue increased 6.3% to USD477 million in 2018 from USD448.9 million. Order intake also increased 6.2% for its ongoing businesses, rising to USD470 million from USD442.6 million. This was attributed to strong Network & Security segment growth, with higher demand for 400G high-speed Ethernet test solutions. The company is expecting to achieve a USD75 million to USD77 million adjusted operating profit for 2018, exceeding market expectations. The company's adjusted operating profit in 2017 was USD58.9 million.Hays, up 2.0%. The recruiter said it has delivered "good" growth in the second quarter of current financial year, with double digit net fees growth in international businesses. The company said net fees in the three months to the end of December grew by 8%, and by 9% on a like-for-like basis. The result was boosted by strong performance in the company's international business, where net fees increased by 11% year-on-year. The gains were partly offset by the relative strength of sterling against the Australian dollar, Hays said. The UK & Ireland saw a solid net fee growth of 3% during the period, despite continued economic uncertainties. Looking ahead, Hays said in intends to continue investments in key structural growth markets like Germany, the US and Asia. ----------FTSE 250 - LOSERS----------Provident Financial, down 19%. The subprime lender said it expects its 2018 profit to come in towards the lower end of market expectations, despite making "further good progress" in the last quarter. Currently, the market forecasts the lender's pretax profit to be between GBP151 million and GBP166 million. A year ago, the company reported a GBP123.0 million pretax loss. Provident attributed the profit warning to tighter underwriting and fewer new account bookings in the final quarter of the year. The group expects to report exceptional costs of GBP55 million in 2018, representing costs associated with the implementation of the home credit recovery plan, comprising intangible and tangible asset write offs, redundancy and consultancy costs, non-cash pension charges and others costs. Ashmore Group, down 2.5%. The emerging markets-focused asset manager said its investment performance was "modestly negative" in the second quarter, as the company added risk to take advantage of mis-pricing. Ashmore posted a negative investment performance of USD200 million for its second quarter ended December 31, compared to a positive performance of USD300 million in its first quarter. The company said that the markets had been "weak ad volatile for much of 2018" and, as such, it had "added risk to take advantage of the indiscriminate mispricing of assets" during the period. "As is typical at such points, there is some moderate underperformance over the shorter term," Ashmore said.----------OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS----------Itaconix, up 41%. The chemicals company said it has signed an exclusive global supply agreement with Nouryon for its bio-based polymers for the detergents market. Under the terms of the contract, the AIM-listed company will produce and supply polymers that Nouryon will market to its customers in household, institutional, and industrial detergent and cleaner applications. In addition, the companies will work together to transition many of Itaconix's current detergent customers to Nouryon. "Our novel polymers offer great value as replacements for phosphates in detergents, which are being phased out due to environmental concerns," said Itaconix Chief Executive John Shaw. ----------OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS----------Altona Energy, down 32%. The mining and exploration company said the resolutions to remove Zhang Qinfu and Ma Chi as directors were not passed. In early December, the firm said it had received a general meeting requisition notice from shareholders Leon Hogan, Nicholas Lyth, and Robert Hales. These shareholders held roughly 15% of Altona's shares and were requesting the removal of Qinfu and Chi. The resolution failed, and so the two directors will remain. A representative of Qinfu gave a statement at the general meeting and said the company's focus should be on "coal mining and underground coal gasification". Qinfu's representative said the company's initial focus should be on investigating the feasibility of product extraction from its Australian coal resources.----------