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Burberry: HSBC increases target price from 1300p to 1500p maintaining a neutral rating.

DUHRRRRRRRR

WHAT A DIFFERENCE WITH THE BROKER PRICE'S

APR Energy: JP Morgan lowers target price from 1005p to 950p, while its overweight rating is left unchanged.

Aberdeen Asset Management: Goldman Sachs upgrades to buy with its target price at 360p.

The days when the London Stock Exchange was a market for trading equities with a few ancillary services bolted on are long gone. The diversification brought about by Xavier Rolet, the Chief Executive, means that, in the final quarter of last year, capital markets accounted for less than a third of revenues of 208.9m pounds, which rose by 6 per cent. Analysts seized on an uptick in that income from flotations as a positive factor, but this remains at a low level, and the total number of companies quoted on the LSE's three equities markets is still in decline. The shares performed well last year, up by about 50 per cent since the start, and are at their highest level for nearly five years. A rating of 12.6 times consensus earnings for the year to end-March does not suggest much upside until the benefits of LCH are clearer, Tempus believes.

Disappointing results from Apple had little effect on UK semi-conductor makers - ARM, the UK's biggest such, actually saw its shares rise. The team at Espirito Santo believes there is little direct read-across from Apple because the rest of the smartphone and tablet market continues to perform so well. "The fact that supply constraints meant Apple could not meet demand hardly seems like bad news longer term too, I suppose," wrote The Times's Tempus on Friday morning.

Positive Points: A programme to increase growth and productivity continues to be pursued. Last year, the company announced a 40/20/10 strategy to focus on its top 40 countries and brand categories that generate the most sales and profit, the top 20 innovations with the most growth potential and the company’s top 10 developing markets. The company increased its outlook for share repurchase to $5 billion - $6 billion, up from its earlier $4 billion - $6 billion range. P&G has implemented a $10 billion cost-cutting plan, which includes reducing headcount by 5,700 by the end of the current financial year. Procter & Gamble is a worldwide manufacturer and marketer of consumer products. The company participates in more than 40 product categories, with 300 brands sold in over 180 countries and therefore enjoys considerable diversification and geographical location. In April 2012, Procter & Gamble increased its dividend for the 56th consecutive year, making Procter & Gamble one of only six U.S. companies with this track record of dividend increases. Procter & Gamble has paid a dividend for 122 consecutive years.

Negative Points: P&G has been under pressure to improve its performance. The situation has been compounded since activist investor William Ackman, a hedge fund manager who bought a stake in the company of about 1% (valued at around $2 billion). Ackman is understood to be critical of senior management. Higher commodity costs (raw materials) remain a pressure on group profit margins. Unfavorable foreign exchange movements continue to impact. Competition across the consumer goods sector remains intense. A deterioration in the group's innovation pipeline could impact growth prospects.

Financial Highlights: The consumer products maker reported profits of $4.06 billion, up from $1.69 billion in the same quarter a year earlier. Revenue increased 2% to $22.18 billion in the period. Operating cash flow was $3.8 billion for the quarter. The Company repurchased $1.4 billion of shares during the quarter and returned $1.6 billion of cash to shareholders as dividends.

Second quarter results: Founded in 1837, Cincinnati headquartered Procter & Gamble unveiled a surge in profits to $4.06 billion, up from $1.69 billion a year earlier. The Company said it delivered broad-based organic sales growth, with all business segments increasing organic sales by 2% or more when compared with the same quarter a year ago. "Our second quarter results were at the high end of our expectations on the top-line and well ahead of forecast on operating profit, earnings per share and cash flow," said Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer, Bob McDonald. The company revised up its organic sales growth forecast to a range of 3% to 4% for the fiscal year from a previous range of 2% to 4%

AMEC's shares are rated at almost 14 times 2013's forecast earnings. Compared with similar companies, that's on a par with Petrofac but considerably lower than Wood Group and Hunting. Meanwhile, AMEC's robust balance sheet allowed it to buy in £400m-worth of its own shares last year. That - along with consistent growth in dividends - demonstrates that management is focused on delivering decent shareholder returns

However, AMEC's strong links to national oil companies (NOCs) in the Middle East should be a help. Analysts at investment bank Societe Generale predict that oil services are set to benefit from a 15 per cent rise in investment by NOCs in 2013. AMEC is already seeing the fruits of a $6bn long-term project management contract with the state-owned Kuwait Oil Company. And last month the group expanded its footprint in the Gulf with a $528m consultancy contract to help develop an oil refinery at Al Zour, Kuwait, for the Kuwait National Petroleum Company. Other forecasts point to the potential in running offshore fields. Energy consultant Douglas Westwood expects over $335bn spending in offshore operations and maintenance (O&M) in 2012-16. Over the previous five-year period, production-related services accounted for 44 per cent of global O&M spending. But many offshore oil and gas fields are maturing, which means operators will need to increase their O&M spending in order to maintain production. Douglas Westwood predicts that demand for offshore production services should grow by over 7 per cent a year until 2016. That is good news for AMEC because management has tweaked the group's product offering to exploit the expected growth in O&M contracts. AMEC is also much better-placed to tap into the rapid expansion of offshore activities on the Norwegian Continental Shelf, as a result of a collaboration agreement it signed with Aibel - one of the largest oil service companies in Norway.

Admittedly, the extent to which oil companies invest depends on crude oil prices. Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest exporter, is keen to keep prices at around $100 a barrel, which is more than adequate to justify planned capital spending. That said, the oil price - and the consequent level of investment - is still sensitive to sluggish economic growth worldwide. And growth prospects for some of AMEC's other segments - namely mining and nuclear power generation - don't look so good. That's because almost all of the world's biggest mining companies have either shelved or axed big capital projects since midway through last year. Meanwhile, the expansion of the world's nuclear power industry remains on hold following Japan's Fukushima disaster in 2012. In aggregate, these businesses account for around 22 per cent of AMEC's revenues

The value of demand for oilfield services has only recently recovered to levels seen before the financial crisis of 2008. Capital spending waxed and waned in the intervening period, but industry analysts now expect a step up in activity this year and next. That could give services providers, such as AMEC, the scale of pricing power that boosted their profits in 2005-07. According to consultancy GBI Research, the value of the market should grow by around 30 per cent to $200bn (£126bn) by the end of 2016. True, the biggest beneficiaries may be those companies that provide big pieces of capital equipment (submersible rigs, for example), but engineers and consultants, such as Amec, will benefit, too.

Demand for oil services - the activities that keep oil fields and refineries running - is set to lift off after a four-year lull. That could give energy consultant AMEC (AMEC) a pricing power that would provide a useful boost to its profits, especially as the group's bosses are tweaking its services to maximise the benefit. AMEC's engineers apply their skills to designing and developing large-scale projects across the oil and gas sector. Energy companies employ AMEC as a consultant for construction projects on a variety of facilities, including offshore platforms, subsea pipelines, crude oil refineries and gas processing plants. They also engage AMEC to establish maintenance programmes, and to provide specialist advice on how to optimise production, improve safety or reduce costs. In other words, operators who have have a technical issue affecting their oil and gas facility can go to AMEC for a solution.

Still, that shouldn't detract from the fact that Hilton is coping well in today's less than ideal conditions. There's also a tasty prospective dividend yield on offer - over 4 per cent based on Numis' estimated payout for end-2013 - supported by impressive cash generation. Yet the shares trade on 12 times the broker's end-2013 earnings estimate - not especially pricey for a food producer, even though most in that sector can't point to a growth story that looks as compelling as the potential from Hilton's Australian joint venture

That success is clear from its recent performance. Despite the impact of higher raw material meat prices on consumer demand, Hilton reported overall volume growth of 10.3 per cent at the half-year stage - helped by a contribution from its new Danish facility. The company is also generating plenty of cash - a fact that helped cut the net debt burden by 40 per cent at the half-year point, while also allowing for decent 10 per cent hike in the half-year dividend payout. Moreover, a trading update this month revealed that Hilton's performance had remained solid. The weak European economic backdrop, though, along with higher meat prices, are a worry. That's forcing cash-strapped consumers to trade down which is bad news for profit margins - the group's half-year operating margin, for example, fell about a percentage point on 2011's half-year margin figure. The group is also experiencing more competition in central Europe and looks heavily dependent on business from a single customer - Tesco, is currently responsible for about 35 per cent of Hilton's sales.

Even without the joint venture, Hilton looks in reasonable shape. It began expanding from its first facility in Huntingdon in 1999 and the group's success has largely reflected a focus on product development and through following existing customers as they entered new markets. It has benefited, in particular, from the fact that its central meat packing model is one that can be replicated relatively easily, while supply and production chains are flexible - allowing Hilton to seamlessly add fresh product lines for customers and take advantage of consumer-led trends.

Meat packaging isn’t the most glamorous of businesses, but Hilton Food (HFG) looks well placed within its sector. Not only does is pack and supply food in state-of-the-art factories for major European supermarkets such as Tesco, Ahold, Albert Heijn and Ica, but it can also point to a degree of growth potential that many of its rivals would struggle to match. That's because Hilton has entered into a joint venture with Australia's largest retailer, Woolworths. The partnership will see Hilton take a 50 per cent stake in a new company, Woolworths Meat Co Pty, which will operate Woolworth's Bunbury Meat Centre. Hilton will run the facility, providing expertise rather than capital, and oversee an upgrade. Bunbury already supplies 84 Woolworths stores in Western Australia and Hilton could eventually supply some of Woolworths' other 3,000 stores. This is a major coup for Hilton which, until now, had been purely focused on European markets and the potential here has led some brokers to hike their earnings forecasts. Peel Hunt and Panmure Gordon, for instance, have upped their end-2014 earnings estimates, by around 4 per cent and 6 per cent, respectively, on the news.