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http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201207120700054798H

Outlook Overall, recent trading supports our confidence in meeting our expectations for the full year. Capital Markets Day Fenner will be hosting a Capital Markets Day at the ECS facility in Drachten, The Netherlands on 18 July. No trading information or guidance will be provided beyond the contents of this statement.

Interim Management Statement Fenner today issues the following Interim Management Statement, which covers the period from 1 March 2012 to date. Current Trading The Group has continued to make solid progress during the period, achieving revenue and earnings in line with expectations. The Engineered Conveyor Solutions ("ECS") division continued to operate at high levels of factory utilisation and operating margins were in line with previous run rates. Notwithstanding strong demand in other regions, ECS has experienced some slowing of order rates from the US coal market as our customers align output with consumption in the wake of an exceptionally mild winter and uneconomic shale gas pricing. There are already early signs that coal stockpiles are returning to more normal levels with a recovery in US natural gas prices, and of an increase in US coal export activity. Our capital investment programmes are proceeding according to plan and will bring welcome additional capacity to operations in The Netherlands and Australia in spring 2013. Our Advanced Engineered Products division has continued to perform in line with expectations, experiencing seasonally higher operating margins as we progress through our second half period. On 18 May 2012 the Group completed the refinancing of its operating bank facilities with a £100m five year revolving credit line with its primary banks. The strong balance sheet and satisfactory gearing level will enable us to continue to pursue our accelerating organic and acquisitive growth plans.

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201207120700064810H

Forecasts and valuation: Cloud upgrade potential The transition to SaaS invariably compresses headline sales growth and earnings, but once made, the financial and commercial benefits should include better visibility borne out of recurring revenues, improved scalability, faster innovation/upgrade cycles and reduced R&D intensity. Based on our maintained forecasts, the shares trade on 17.4x our FY12 earnings forecast, falling to 16.7x in FY13. We do not see this as demanding given the transitional nature of the model and the earnings potential once the transition is made. Moreover, our forecasts continue to assume relatively modest targets for the StatPro Revolution cloud services product.

http://www.edisoninvestmentresearch.co.uk/researchreports/statpro120712update.pdf

Shares in fund management Ashmore took a battering on Thursday morning after its fourth-quarter statement but Peel Hunt has maintained its 'buy' recommendation and 440p target price for stock saying that it still offers 'long-term structural growth'. "Given the slightly lower period-end AuM, and recent performance, we would expect to reduce our forecasts for the next two years," said analyst Stuart Duncan. The broker said that it expects to reduce its target price but has maintained a positive view on the stock due to the "significant growth opportunity over the longer term as asset allocations to EM products continue to increase, although in the short term enthusiasm will be tempered by the current macro backdrop."

The quarter saw assets under management decrease 3.3% to US$63.7 billion. The drivers of this decrease were adverse investment performance of US$1.6 billion and net outflows of US$0.6 billion. There were net inflows within the external debt, with the largest movements arising on the introduction of a new segregated mandate. Net outflows were experienced within the equities theme, spread across public and segregated mandates, and within the multi-strategy theme, predominantly from one of the Japanese retail fund products. Other themes remained flat in the quarter. Investment performance was positive within the external debt theme, with adverse performance in the equities, multi-strategy and alternatives themes whilst the corporate and blended debt themes remained flat in the quarter. As expected, performance fees for the year overall are estimated to be £25 million, almost entirely earned in the first half (H1 2011/12 £23.0 million: FY2010/11 £85.4 million), and principally from investment performance for funds with an August 2011 year end. The Group will announce its results in respect of the financial year to 30 June 2012 on 11 September 2012. There will be a presentation for analysts at 0900 on that date at the offices of Goldman Sachs at Peterborough Court, 133 Fleet Street London EC4M 2BB. A copy of the presentation will be made available on the Group's website at www.ashmoregroup.com.

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201207120700064813H

The quarter saw assets under management increase 9.1% to US$65.9 billion. The drivers of this increase were net inflows of US$1.2 billion and positive investment performance of US$4.3 billion. There were net inflows within the overlay, external debt, local currency, corporate debt and multi-strategy themes, whilst modest net outflows occurred in the equities and blended debt themes. Consistent with Ashmore's long standing investment approach of adding risk during periods of market volatility such as that experienced in our first half, all investment themes have subsequently delivered positive investment performance in what has been a strong third quarter, with equities, external debt and local currency contributing most to the increase in AuM. The Group continues to perform in line with management's expectations.

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201204120700131717B

Berenberg initiates buy on Catlin Group, target price 544p.

Packaging design firm Imagelinx (ILI) cut to the chase by admitting May and June revenues saw a marked deterioration, with levels considerably below that seen in the first four months of the year. The business attributed the sudden decline in spending across almost all of its clients to the effects the recent economic uncertainty in Europe has had on confidence. Imagelinx noted it had made significant steps in realigning costs to mitigate the impact of these low trading levels, although it admitted it is unlikely a recovery in turnover will be seen before the third quarter of 2012. Imagelinx shares plummeted 0.1375p to 0.3375p.

Confidence in the management and investment strategy of Creon Resources (CRO) was evident on Wednesday as the oil and gas infrastructure investment company announced it has raised the maximum possible amount of 12.08 million pounds at 0.5p a share via a subscription offer, the amount raised more than 44 times its pre-announcement market cap of 270,000 pounds. The proceeds will be used to pursue and execute investment opportunities as and when they materialise, with the group admitting it was in the process of examining several opportunities. This includes a potential joint venture investment currently at the 'advanced discussions' stage, which a substantial amount of the proceeds would be channeled in to. Creon shares jumped 0.2125p to 0.8425p.

Outlook As previously stated, the main challenges for the Company, in this financial year of 53 trading weeks, have been the continuing cost pressures resulting from government legislation, including increases in excise duty, business rates and carbon tax. We expect to achieve a reasonable outcome for the current financial year.

JD Wetherspoon (JDW) saw sales in the 11 weeks ended 8th July 2012 rise by 11.9% on 2011's comparable period, boosted by strong contributions from the jubilee celebrations and Euro 2012 championships. Since the start of the year the pub chain opened 40 new pubs while closing three, and noted plans of opening between 20 and 30 in the next financial year. JD Wetherspoon shares swelled by 16.2p to 437.9p.

ommenting on the Group's performance in the fourth quarter, Alistair Cox, Chief Executive, said: "Trading conditions in many markets became increasingly challenging through the quarter as concern about the global economy reduced confidence amongst our clients and candidates, particularly in the permanent recruitment markets. In that context, I am pleased that we delivered solid growth in Group net fees, driven by growth of 8%* in our International business, where 13 countries grew by more than 10%*, including our market-leading German business. The UK remained very difficult, particularly in the Banking and City-related specialisms. Looking ahead, I expect overall conditions to remain challenging but growth opportunities do still exist. We've deliberately built a business which is well diversified by country and specialism and has a healthy balance of temp, interim and permanent revenues. Each of these markets is different, and we will continue to react quickly to changing conditions in each, investing selectively where we see growth and defending profitability and cashflow where markets are more difficult."

Recruitment agencies continue to struggle, with Hays (HAS) reporting a 10% fall in UK & Ireland net fees during the quarter ended 30th June 2012, year-on-year, with total net fees for the group down by 1%. However, the company noted strong growth in Continental Europe, with Germany reporting a 25% rise in like-for-like net fees. It added that it reduced its net debt position to 135 million pounds from 177.7 million pounds as at 31st December 2011. The shares dropped by 2.5p to 70.55p.

Eilef Stange, Gasnor's Chief Executive Officer, said: "Shell's customer reach and Gasnor's LNG sales and marketing experience is a winning combination. There is real growth potential for small scale LNG in Europe, particularly in the marine sector, and Gasnor with Shell is well placed to capitalise on this.

Colin Abraham, Shell's Vice President for Downstream LNG, said: "The benefits of natural gas in meeting our future energy needs are well-documented. Shell believes the Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) in transport sector will develop into a sizeable market and given its industry leading expertise across the LNG value chain, the extension into this market is a good fit for Shell. The Gasnor acquisition provides Shell with invaluable customer and market insight built up over a number of years. This will help us to quickly develop and meet customer requirements for LNG as a transport fuel."