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Shares of Crawshaw carved out healthy gains in early trading after it said like-for-like (LFL) sales continued to improve in the six months to July 31st despite the tough retail climate. The Yorkshire-based meat processing firm said LFL sales increased 4% in the 6-month period while overall sales fell to £9.3m from £9.4 in 2011 after the closure of it Doncaster market site and its mobile unit. "Given the reduction in overall sales, as indicated above, overall costs have fallen. However, the sales related reduction in overheads has been partially offset by our investment in marketing related activities and certain restructuring costs. The benefits of this investment are becoming apparent in the second half," the group explained. Half-year profit rose to £89,892 from £71,805 previously and gross margin increased to 43.6%. In reaction to Governments proposals to add VAT to certain, currently exempt, cooked products, the group said it intends to sell such products 'on the cool' and therefore VAT free. "We have invested in equipment, additional staff and staff training to prepare for the changes," Crawshaw said. The initiatives being taken have helped improve LFL sales further and in the eight weeks since the half-year LFL sales were up 7%. Crawshaw conceded that the retail climate remains particularly challenging, and is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. However on an encouraging note, the group still saw improvements in average spend of 9% over the last year.

Charles Taylor, which provides professional services to clients in the global insurance market, has appointed Tito Soso as Interim Group Chief Financial Officer to replace George Fitzsimons, who as previously announced will be stepping down as an Executive Director and as Group Finance Director at the end of October. Soso joined the firm on Monday to ensure a smooth transition. The company is continuing to search for a permanent replacement. Soso, aged 45, was most recently a Managing Director in Investcorp's European Investment team where he was responsible for leading private equity transactions across Europe. In this role he held non-executive director and acting Chief Financial Officer positions in a variety of portfolio companies. David Marock, Group Chief Executive said: "Tito has extensive experience in both permanent and interim senior financial officer roles and we are very pleased to welcome him to the group. "His breadth of knowledge across different industry sectors and strategic insight will be of immense value as we implement our strategic plan for growth. We remain committed to finding a permanent Group Chief Financial Officer to help drive the business forward and will update the market in due course

Ceramic Fuel Cells, whose technology converts natural gas into electricity and heating, has secured a long term project for its powder plant in the UK. The deal with an unnamed multinational ceramics and chemicals company will see the plant used to develop high quality ceramic powder products. The plant equipment and staff will be allocated to the project on a full time basis. To cover the operating costs of the plant and related staff, Ceramic Fuel Cells will receive a fee of £450,000 for the 12 month project.

Data centre firm CSF Group dropped 12 per cent in morning trading on Tuesday after it reported delays to a project in Malaysia would put a break on revenues this year. The firm said expansion plans for its CX6 data centre would mean increased development and maintenance revenue. However, it would also result in delays in this revenue to the next financial year and beyond. The company said it "no longer expects to recognise any development revenue from CX6 in the current financial year as the revised proposal is being reviewed by the customer".

LZYE Group, the Hong Kong-based provider of children's educational, artistic and activity programmes, said it had expanded into mainland China for the first time. The company has entered into a conditional agreement to acquire Nantong LZYE Education Advisory for a total consideration of HK$6.72m, of which HK$3.36m is payable in cash. The rest will come from the issue of 2.24m new ordinary shares in LZYE issued at 12p per share. In London its shares rose 4.8% on the news.

Restore said it has acquired Archive Solutions, a Manchester-based records management business, for an initial cost of £2.6m. An earn-out deal is included dependent on the performance of Archive Solutions over the next three years and will be paid to its shareholders in 2015. Restore also said it intended to place over three million new ordinary shares at 93p each, raising £3.0m before expenses. The placing proceeds would be used to fund the cash part of the acquisition and to fund further bolt-on deals, it said.

Hampden Underwriting, which provides investors with a limited liability direct investment into the Lloyd's insurance market, said it had completed the acquisition of insurance broker Nameco, having received the necessary regulatory approval. Application has been made for the 1.1m new ordinary shares issued as consideration for the acquisition to be admitted to trading on AIM and this is expected to become effective on October 5th 2012.

Parallel Media, a sports marketing and digital media agency, has said that its 51 per cent owned Asian subsidiary, Parallel Media Group Asia (PMGA), has extended its strategic partnership with UnUsUaL Entertainment. An agreement was signed between the two companies two months ago, since when several sponsorship deals have been awarded to PMGA for UnUsUaL Entertainment's concerts in 2012. The extension means that PMGA will represent UnUsUaL on sponsorship rights for their projects in 2013. Managing Director of PMGA, Toh Jin Wei, said: "Entertainment is a fantastic platform for brands to reach out to their target audience and we look forward to delivering greater results and have a measurable impact on both UnUsUaL and our clients."

On top of that, the effect of the European peat shortage is expected to reduce the size of the UK professional growing sector which is particularly reliant on the use of peat. So, despite the anticipated increase in prices, the company expects revenues will take a hit in the current financial year, which runs to the end of September. Fortunately, Sinclair makes the industry's leading peat alternative - SuperFyba - and demand for peat alternatives is expected to grow significantly before the 2013 spring growing season. To meet this demand, Sinclair will begin producing SuperFyba at its newly acquired site at Ellesmere Port from November 2012. The company has planning permission to produce SuperFyba seven days a week, 24 hours a day at this site. The lousy weather has hit demand for plant growing products, however, with the company reporting that the UK "growing media" market and soil conditioner market declined by 19.2% and 18.8% respectively in the 12 months to July 2012. These two markets are the bedrock of Sinclair's business. As might be expected, the board tried to put a positive spin on things, emphasising the medium and long-term prospects of the group. "The performance in the year ending September 30th 2012 has been badly affected by unprecedented weather conditions and is not a reflection of the long term prospects of the business," the company said

A number of companies have used Britain's lousy summer as a reason - some would say excuse - for poor performance, but gardening products supplier William Sinclair has more justification than most. The group has warned that full year profits will be below market expectations, sending the shares to a 52-week nadir, while the final dividend for the current year is set to be lower than last year's final divi of 4.4p. The board fully intends to re-instate its progressive dividend policy in future financial years. It is the second profit warning the company has issued in the second half of 2012, and once again heavy rainfall is to blame. Bernard Burns, the Chief Executive Officer, looks like he might be carrying the can for the collapse in the share price, as he has announced he will resign from the board in early 2013 once his replacement has been appointed. The wettest summer in the UK for 100 years has caused widespread flooding in the area where the company's peat bogs are located, hampering the company's ability to harvest peat. The situation has not been much better in other areas where peat is harvested, and the group expects shortages of supplies will lead to price rises of around 10% to 15% for peat based growing media at the shop till.

Shares also dropped at Serabi Gold after it said it had placed £16.2m of new shares with Fratelli Investments, one of its major shareholders, to finance the development and start-up of underground mining operations at its Palito gold mine. In addition, Fratelli has provided the firm with an interim secured short term loan facility of $6.0m - around £3.7m - to provide additional working capital to enable the company to commence the initial works at Palito. The firm was trading down 4.3% by 1015 on Tuesday morning, following the announcement.

"The study shows that the existing pit can be further developed as a high grade, low cost mine with robust project economics and a rapid payback period. The company currently caries no value for the resource but with today's updated estimate will look to correct this in due course. "We will now look to accelerate the development and implementation of a large-scale underground project at our flagship operation on the Fwaya-Fwaya belt, while continuing to assess the potential future development of the additional belts available within the greater mining licence area." The company is continuing extensive diamond core-drilling and bulk-sampling work through the Kagem mining licence area on the remaining known, but as yet un-proven, emerald bearing deposi

Shares in emerald miner Gemfields rose over nine per cent on Tuesday after the company announced a JORC compliant indicated mineral resource of 2.75m tonnes of emerald and beryl at 365 carats per tonne. The company also unveiled a JORC compliant inferred mineral resource of 9,200 tonnes of emerald and beryl at 24.5 carats/tonne. The JORC code is the set of standards set out by the Joint Ore Reserves Committee for the reporting of reserves and resources to the public. The projected life-of-mine (LOM) is 20 years, producing around 34m carats per annum. The company is about to begin work to accelerate underground construction and development in the full year 2014-15. Projected nominal cash flow over the LOM is around $855m, with capital expenditure over the LOM forecast at $113.2m. Ian Harebottle, Gemfields' Chief Executive Officer, said: "Today we have achieved a key milestone in the continual development of Gemfields. The study shows that extending the current open pit mine at Kagem to a large-scale underground operation will be economically enhancing to the company and to our shareholders. The study covers only Kagem's existing principal pit on the Fwaya-Fwaya belt, which is one of several known emerald bearing belts available within the Kagem licence area.

3Legs Resources, an independent group focusing on the exploration and development of unconventional oil and gas, has said that, as anticipated, ConocoPhillips did not exercise its option to take a 70 per cent interest in 3Legs's three eastern Baltic Basin concessions in northern Poland. ConocoPhillips last month exercised its option to become operator of the concessions. 3Legs said is considers that its drilling and seismic operations to date have increased the probability of success in this most prospective acreage, as compared to assessments made at the time of its initial public offering in June 2011. The firm will now explore its options carefully before engaging in any operations on its eastern concessions. Meanwhile, on the western concessions operations are continuing to proceed, with testing equipment now mobilised to the Lebien location, where further testing is due to begin imminently on the Lebien LE-2H horizontal well. Peter Clutterbuck, Chief Executive of 3Legs Resources, said: "ConocoPhillips's decision not to exercise its option on our three eastern Baltic Basin concessions is consistent with our own strategy of high-grading our acreage and focusing our activity on those areas which we believe offer most potential. We are firmly focused on prioritising and further de-risking the considerable areas that offer the most prospectivity in our Baltic Basin acreage, which are situated on our western concessions."

Sten Mortstedt, the Executive Chairman of CLS Holdings, a property investment company, has sold by tender 368,371 shares in the company on behalf of himself and his family. The shares were tendered for up to and including the pro rata entitlement of one ordinary share for every 76 ordinary shares at 805p per share. The family pocketed a totalled £2.97m. Following the sale the Mortstedt family holds 23.1m shares. Over the past year the company's share price has risen 24%, equal to 139p. In its most recent set of results, the firm said net assets per share in the six months to June 30th rose 5.6% to 1037.7p from 983.1p at the end of 2011. The aggregate value of net assets rose 3.1% to £458.5m from the year-end figure of £444.9m, as the company enjoyed a boost from receiving planning permission for its Spring Mews mixed-use development and completed the second of its German pre-lets. Group revenue in the first half of the year edged up to £40.0m from £39.9m the year before, but profit before tax fell to £27.3m from £37.1m, in part because the gain on the revaluation if investment properties was lower this time round at £10.1m versus £14.1m last year.

Engineering support firm Babcock said it was enjoying buoyant markets as customers turned to it to make cost savings. The company said it was confident of meeting its expectations for this financial year and delivering strong progress on last year. Both civil and military markets remained strong as current and potential customers continued to seek increased efficiency and improved availability of assets, Babcock said. During the first half, cash generation across the group remained strong and the firm expects to see a reduction in net debt at the half year mark. The trading update, which covered the six months to the end of September, noted the company's order book was unchanged at around £13bn. Across the divisions there has been a regular flow of smaller contract wins and extensions moving from the bid pipeline during the first half of the year, Babcock said The bid pipeline, which increased to £13bn at the time of the interim management statement in July, had also remained stable. The firm said there was a significant number of large opportunities under bid, the majority of which we expect to be awarded over the next 18 months.

The John Laing Infrastructure Fund (JLIF) said it had successful raised over 60 million pounds in a share issue that was significantly oversubscribed. The fundraising effort, which included an open offer, a subscription offer and a placing, means almost 57m new shares will be issued pulling in a total of £60.4m for the company. The proceeds will be used to acquire two new projects and an additional stake in Forth Valely Royal Hospital from John Laing Group. Chairman Paul Lester said the demand for new shares came despite a backdrop of ongoing uncertainty in capital markets. "Investors remain attracted to our proven, low-risk model offering a high, predictable dividend yields," he said. "We will be using the proceeds to acquire a new portfolio of three quality, operational, public/private partnership assets, which meet JLIF's stated investment strategy."

Demand in the UK heating market declined throughout the year, although demand for other product categories performed better, the company revealed. "There is no evidence yet of improving market conditions and therefore growth will only come from market share gains in the short term," the group said. The Nordic countries and France let the side down, however, with the former seeing a 2.9% decline in LFL sales while France's LFL sales were down 5.6%. Weak consumer confidence affected the RMI market in the Nordics, and margins came under pressure in the second half of the year. In France, new construction markets weakened substantially in the second half. Government incentives put in place in the last two years are ending and demand is expected to continue to decline in the current year. Share price reaction to the results was negative. The special dividend payment was not unexpected, and, as broker Charles Stanley noted: "Wolseley's markets are becoming more difficult and this can be seen in the quarterly progression of revenues." "In Q4 [fourth quarter], LFL revenue of the ongoing operations improved by 2.9% compared to Q3 (+3.8%), Q2 (5%) and Q1 (4.8%). Also, markets are very competitive and in 2012, the gross margin slipped 0.2% to 27.5%. Nevertheless, overall, the group expects to make 'good progress in the year ahead' and it was pleasing to see the special dividend," Charles Stanley said. The broker has downgraded the stock from "accumulate" to "hold", as it believes the share price, which has risen by about two-thirds over the last 12 months, is now "well up with events".

"Demand across our markets remains mixed and the economic outlook continues to be uncertain. Revenue growth rates in the new financial year have been similar to the fourth quarter of last year," Meakins revealed. "Whilst we remain cautious about the outlook for our markets, we are confident that Wolseley will make good progress in the year ahead," he added. In light of market conditions in Continental Europe the group anticipates it will incur further restructuring charges of up to £25m this year, which are expected to be charged to trading profit. Fourth quarter performance North America continued to be the star of the show in the fourth quarter with the USA seeing 6.7% year-on-year (y/y) like-for-like (LFL) revenue growth, while Canada's LFL revenue was up 4.5% y/y. The repair, maintenance and improvement (RMI) market remained resilient in the USA while the group enjoyed a boost from the slight increase in new residential construction. In Canada, new residential markets remained buoyant while infrastructure spending continued to grow. The UK, which accounts for 13% of group revenue, saw LFL revenue growth of 3.5% y/y, and Central Europe also grew, with LFL sales up 0.7%

"Wolseley continues to be highly cash generative and we have adequate resources to fund future investment in the business alongside growth in ordinary dividends," said Ian Meakins, the group's Chief Executive. Revenue from continuing businesses in the year rose 5.4%, or 3.8% on a like-for-like (LFL) basis, to £12,716m from £12,061m the year before. Trading profit from ongoing businesses jumped 10.4% to £658m from £596m the year before, but goodwill impairment of £353m relating to acquisitions made in its debt-fuelled acquisition spree in 2003 to 2007 put a dent in reported profit before tax, which fell to £198m from £391m last year. The trading margin for the ongoing business was 5.2%, 0.3 percentage points higher than the previous year. The gross margin in the ongoing business was slightly lower at 27.5% (2011: 27.7%) as a result of very competitive market conditions, price deflation in some product categories and the supplier settlement noted in the first half. Headline earnings per share rose 17.8% to 168.4p from 142.9p the previous year.