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Last day of August I posted the hope that Banco would break 450p. Fortnight later...

Looking at the figures, the new agreed instalment plan and the cancellation of the claimed interest payments, seem to put Essar back to some financial certainty. I shall not be surprised when more analysts upgrade their price predictions. I am holding with high expectations but patience may still be needed. What with the growth in oil consumption in the sub-continent, the continuing increase in oil prices, and Essar's investment in production of more refined oils, the price could even fly towards the £3 it was at a year ago. If I had the cash I would be adding to my holding still. Essar is very much a world-wide company and runs the refinery at Stanlow, Manchester for instance, as well as many exploration and mining operations in Africa, Asis and Indonesia.

Centaur have just completed the acquisition of Econsultancy for an initial £12m. A further 38 million will be due in 2016. In the last year Econsultancy reported revenue of £6.6m and EBITDA of £1.1m. This adds to other recent acquisitions: FEM April 2011, £1.5m last year: IPL August 2011, £0.9m last year; VBR December 2011, ££0.5m last year; Excite December 2011, £0.2m last year; Profile February 2012, £3.1m last year. Only FEM is considered fully integrated so far so there is much work to do.

I misread a date... Sorry

Resolution (LON:RSL) said that the integration of its recently acquired businesses (Friends Provident, the AXA UK Life Business and Bupa Health Assurance) has progressed in line with expectations, driving its profits up more than twofold in the first half of the year. Today’s interim report showed that the insurance focused group's pre-tax profits surge from £151 million a year earlier to £390 million in the first six months of 2011 as revenues climbed from £1.9 billion to £3.75 billion. The strong half yearly performance prompted the group to increase its dividend by 18.5 percent to 6.47 pence and reaffirm its 2013 guidance.Friends Provident, the AXA

Up 5p or 7.17% today, 9p or 13.69% on the week. Big jump at the end of the day. WestHouse Securities cuts Cluff Gold CLUF.L price target to 112p from 117p; rating strong buy.

In the period we have seen good performance from the legacy DS Smith business despite the ongoing tough trading environment. Trading in the SCA Packaging business has been fully in line with expectations, reflecting the continuing difficult market conditions. As previously announced, we expect to deliver a return on capital from the acquisition above our weighted average cost of capital, in the financial year. This is based on the cost and capital synergies previously announced. We also continue to expect net debt / EBITDA to fall below 2.0x by the end of the first full financial year of ownership. Shares well up over two days.

Looks like LEVIS is almost proved right already. A real uplift of 5% today. The worry remains Euro panic, basically the main reason these shares are so affordable now anyway. Probably the panic is unnecessary given Banco's world stance and its own situation in Spain. It is not one of the banks the Spanish government seem concerned about. If anyone knows different please post. I use the quarterly dividends from Banco to fund another share purchase each year, usually a more adventurous investment as I regard it as a free buy (or a freebie?)...

I have lost on these shares having held them for five years, but I love the yearly dividends. The dividend is almost 12% at current price. Adding in the dividends I suppose I am very slightly up but only just. I bought them when I believed analysts who expected prices to go up 50%, but of course they never have. After all that the company is definitely sound and I am certainly not going to sell now as I think they are on the way back. i think they are a buy because of the prospects and the dividend.

Dividend this year is 28.38 pence, about 5%, and going up to an expected 30.45pence next year. Other news seems good enough to keep a buy rating. I still don't quite understand why there is little competition. Did Inmarsat actually launch satellites to serve their business customers?

On the Centaur website are very clear and simple results presentations in pdf format. http://www.centaur.co.uk/section_iframe.asp?framecatid=120&path=http://online.hemscottir.com/ir/cau/ir.jsp?page=reports

Highlights All new units of refinery expansion and optimisation stabilised & refinery now operating at over 20 mmtpa capacity. Benefit of higher complexity begins to get reflected. Current price GRM $5.12/bbl over IEA Singapore margins during Q1FY13 against $2.5/bbl over the same benchmark margin in Q1FY12. Full margin benefit of approx. $7-8 /bbl over IEA will start getting reflected from next quarter onwards. Highest ever quarterly revenue in Q1FY13, up 34% to Rs 22,109 crore as compared to Rs 16,478 crore in Q1 FY12. Steep fall in crude oil prices coupled with sharp depreciation in rupee has severely impacted the financial results of Indian refining companies. Q1FY13 PAT at negative Rs 1,400 crore compared to Rs 73 crore (net of Rs 375 crore of sales tax benefit) in Q1FY12. With upward movement of crude oil price and stabilisation of rupee at Rs 56 levels against the US dollar, coupled with higher margins coming out of enhanced refinery complexity and stabilisation of ramped up capacity, the results are expected to witness significant upward movement from next quarter. Vadinar Refinery received “Refinery of the Year” Award from Petroleum Federation of India. CEO says, “With the completion of our optimization project during the quarter, we have significantly moved up in the refining value chain and our world class assets have begun delivering value to our stakeholders. Benefits of higher capacity and complexity have already begun reflecting in our results. We are very happy to report highest ever quarterly revenues at Rs 22,109 crore, and significant improvement of GRMs over the benchmark margins. Going forward, we are confident of maintaining the momentum of improved GRMs, given the full benefit of our expansion will accrue from current quarter onwards.”

http://www.fiberweb.com/investors/reports-and-presentation/audiocast Especially watched with reference to all the comments here... I have held these for a while but mainly because I live in Maldon where one of their factories is, and I try to keep three or four local shares in my ISA.

Rumours of excellent figures on the way and another american milestone passed on the testing/marketing fronts.

Costain announces, 23rd August, another strong performance with a 16% increase in underlying operating profit and an 8% increase in the dividend for the first six months of 2012.

I have been reading O2O's half year report carefully. The market doubts are probably because there are a number of one off costs that have affected several profit figures. One of these was extra holidays in the Olympic Games Period, another a big one off contract cost, but there are several. We are, of course, assured several times that these are singularities. I believe the growth of this quite creative company will continue. They are holding their excellent dividend of 3.6p and the management feel that current and future business justifies this. I have held these shares for four years now and they have been an excellent investment for my ISA. I think this may actually be a 'buying opportunity'.

Initial £100m strategic investment programme within target range – overall annualised post tax return of 12.2% for projects which are fully up and running. Next phase £150m strategic investment programme on track. The UK business delivered 6% revenue growth and UK Municipal PFI/PPP contracts achieved 10% trading margins up from 6.4% last year. The Organics business across all our markets delivered 28% revenue growth and trading margins increased from 13% to 18%. Another strong performance from our Dutch Hazardous Waste business with trading profit up 26% in the year.

Amlin have just increased their dividend. they now pay over 6%. Coupled with the much improved performance after a difficult year of disasters. A share to keep for the income.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-08-16/santander-mexico-said-to-seek-as-much-as-4-billion-in-offering.html If this is true it may make Santander a better buy. Nothing like a lot of cash to please the markets... Santander has been a mixed blessing in my ISA but the dividends appear reliably four times a year and because they really are a world bank rather than a euro bank I am still investing when I can and hoping for better over the next year.

http://www.businessweekly.co.uk/biomedtech-/14434-vectura-45m-asthma-drug-haul-just-the-start Rapidly becoming the star in my ISA Vectura is explained well in this piece from Business Weekly.