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http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=20120907070000PFD5B

WH Ireland downgrades Belgravium Technologies from buy to market perform, target price cut from 10.5p to 6p.

* dip a toe, not did a toe!

buzle - did you did a toe in here - very very decent gains in the last fortnight and in the last week.

Craneware Buy 06-Sep-12 £19,813.20 Keith Neilson 5,270 @ 375.96p

Admiral Group Buy 05-Sep-12 £22,731.36 Henry Engelhardt 2,059 @ 1,104.00p

Greencore Group Buy 06-Sep-12 £14,565.19 Patrick F Coveney 26,284 @ 55.42p Greencore Group Buy 06-Sep-12 £10,195.74 Conor O'Leary 18,399 @ 55.42p

Two directors of emerging markets-focused investment group City of London disposed of beneficial interests they have in the company on Wednesday, just two days after the firm’s full-year results revealed a large decline in funds under management (FuM). Non-executive director David Cardale and Finance Director Doug Allison sold a total of 153,125 shares in the company in order to fund personal property projects, City of London said. Cardale disposed 53,125 for 325p a piece generating £172,656, leaving his resultant holding at 53,125, equal to 0.2% of the issued share capital.

WH Ireland Securities initiates buy on 4imprint Group, target price 375p.

Societie Generale downgrades Britvic from buy to hold, target price increased from 320p to 365p.

Societie Generale upgrades Barr (A G) from sell to hold, target price increased from 370p to 444p.

JP Morgan Cazenove upgrades Rangold Resources from neutral to overweight, target price increased from 5,560p to 7,440p

Outlook Despite the challenges facing the economy, the new financial year has started well and trading is in line with the Board's expectations. We will continue to work hard to attract more passengers by providing high quality, value for money services combined with innovative marketing and products. We will also seek to drive the business forward by leveraging the benefits of Group scale, targeting further cost efficiencies and carefully assessing all potential growth opportunities. We expect to deliver another strong result in bus, even with significant cost headwinds arising from the reduction in BSOG and increased fuel costs. In rail, we anticipate a robust performance despite higher bid costs and a weaker performance in Southern, due to the impact of the economic climate on the franchise bid profile. The Group remains in a good financial position with strong cash generation and a robust balance sheet, underpinning the dividend policy and allowing flexibility to pursue further value-adding acquisitions.

David Brown, Group Chief Executive, commented: "Over the last year, Go-Ahead has made significant progress in building a stronger Group and delivering on our strategic goals. Most recently, I am really proud of the key role our staff played in helping to deliver a highly successful transport network for the London 2012 Olympic Games. "Against a challenging economic backdrop, we have continued to drive growth across our bus and rail companies and carried a record number of passengers on our services. The year also saw the Group's largest ever investment in our bus fleet and the roll-out of "the key" smartcard across our bus operations outside London. "Our deregulated bus business performed exceptionally well in the year, delivering record operating profit and sector leading passenger growth and our London bus operations remain best in class. In line with the Group's strategy to grow our core bus division, we acquired four value-enhancing deregulated businesses, strengthening our portfolio of resilient operations in the South. In our regulated business, we moved into North London with the acquisition of the Northumberland Park depot. "Overall, the Group's rail division performed well during the period, with strong operational performance across all three franchises and good passenger revenue growth, particularly in London Midland. Southern has started to be impacted by the economic environment, as the bid model assumed stronger economic growth rates than are currently being experienced. "Our three rail franchises carry almost a third of all rail passengers in England. We have significant experience of successfully managing complex commuter franchises and delivering industry leading projects and will be using this expertise to deliver a strong bid for the new Thameslink franchise. "Despite the challenges facing the economy, the new financial year has started well and trading is in line with the Board's expectations. We operate in a market that has many fundamental strengths and we are well placed to benefit from the growing need for a sustainable and efficient public transport system."

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201209060700106118L

Go-Ahead Group, which operates a huge bus network and several big rail franchises, has beaten expectations for full-year revenue but admits its Southern rail franchise is suffering in the downturn. Revenue for the year was £2.424bn, 5.5% ahead of the previous year with the company pointing to “strong passenger revenue growth” in the deregulated bus and train divisions as the driver for the upturn. The market consensus had been for revenues of £2.389bn. Go-Ahead’s operating profit came in at £110.2m, down on the 2011 figure of £115.1m and slightly behind the market consensus of £110.5m. Go-Ahead says, excluding income of £13.0m from a one-off rail contract last year, underlying operating profit was up £8.1m. Profits before tax came in at £94.2m, 3.4% down on the prior year’s figure of £97.6m. The final dividend has been set at 55.5p per share, the same as last year, leaving the the total dividend for the year unchanged at 81.0p.

CONT At a share price of 220.6p (last seen) the company has cash valued at 6p per share; total assets under management worth 320p per share; balance sheet attributable assets valued at nearly 75p a share; net tangible assets worth nearly 18p a share; annual operating cash of £454 million (covering the annual dividend cost of £85 million more than five times. Most strikingly, comparable interim operating margins rose from 7.5% to 9.2% and net margins from 5.75%. Trading showed North American car production up by more than a fifth, with up-market vehicles in demand. GKN Driveline sales rose by 9% to £1.66 billion. The group’s powder metallurgy business rose a quarter to £47 million. It is to be understood that GKN equity is geared by 65% of debt. We are told that when the takeover of the Volvo business is finally done it will pause from further acquisitions in order to enhance earnings and pay down debt. GKN (GKN) was tipped here twenty four months ago at 96p. Last seen, the shares at 220.6p (having peaked at 237p in February) have seen a capital gain of 130% plus paid out dividends. With the above considerations and on estimated earnings of 25p for this year and 28p next year, the shares are on prospective price to earnings ratios of 8.6 and 7.5 and forecast dividend yields of 3.3% and 3.8%. They look underpriced for a company with an increasing aero business. A Buy.

Buy GKN (GKN) at 220.6p I have been keen on GKN for some time, having tipped it originally in August 2009 when it seemed underpriced against its fundamental attractions. Those attractions have recently increased; first with the announcement to acquire the Volvo aerospace business and second with an assessment of the latest six months results to 30th June 2012. The acquisition of the Volvo business should transform GKN. The company’s existing aerospace division accounts for just over a fifth of group sales and profits. It is the activity with highest trading margin at 11.2%; the average trading margin is 8.5% and the trading margin on the driveline business (nearly half of group sales) is merely 7.1%. So, one may see that an aerospace acquisition would on the face of it, increase average trading margins significantly. We are told that such an acquisition would mean the enlarged aero space contributing 40% of earnings. Results for the six months to June were also very encouraging. Sales revenue increased by 16%. Reported statutory operating profit increased by 43% (31% underlying) earnings by 38% (32% underlying) and the dividend payout was increased 20%, reflecting both performance and confidence. Despite headwinds from Europe, management had unchanged expectations for the year as a whole and expected another ‘good year’.

Outlook We are seeing significant growth in the quality of revenues and number of customers in the UK, Europe and ROW despite the continuing financial concerns in these territories. The growth of charity and Government backed Research and Development (R&D) enterprises has increased noticeably over the last year and we are gaining revenues from these largely virtual organisations that depend on the outsourcing model to function. The increasing acceptance of in vitro toxicology assays to predict drug-induced liver injury (DILI) and cardiotoxicity by our customers in place of in vivo studies has led to growth in the number of clients using these services. We are hopeful that we will see continued growth, especially of larger contracts for such services in the second half of the year. We continue to gain larger strategic contracts for our ADME services particularly in Europe. We expect this trend to continue as large and medium pharma companies outsource these assays as part of their budget reductions and R&D restructuring. In summary, we anticipate trading in the second half of the year to be very strong based on our order book and July and August revenues. Historically, we have typically seen a 45% : 55% seasonal split to our sales when comparing the first to the second half of the year. We are confident that we will recover any lost ground we have seen in the US and the Board believes the Company is on track to meet market expectations for revenues and profits for the full year.

Steve Harris, Chairman of Cyprotex PLC, said: "2012 has so far seen an excellent improvement in revenues and quality of business in Europe and the Rest of the World offset somewhat by the Company's performance in the US, mainly due to delays in completing a high content toxicology deal in the period. That said, sales of our established and new ADME assays have significantly improved over the corresponding period by 17% highlighting the businesses underlying strength. We expect revenues from the signing of several high content toxicology deals will be registered in the second half of the year and that combined with continued growth of our product offerings, as exemplified by the deals announced today, will accentuate our traditional bias towards generating revenues and profitability in that period. The Board remains confident of achieving market expectations for revenues and profits for the full year."