Member Info for mulledwine

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201206250916110439G

Shares of precious metals producer Polymetal International were given a lift on Monday morning by Nomura, which upgraded its rating on the stock from 'reduce' to 'buy'. The broker says that Polymetal, which listed in London in November 2011, has "slipped under the radar of institutions" during a period of negative sentiment towards precious metal miners, especially due to its complex operations and Russian exposure. "This has left Polymetal an underperformer and its valuation is undemanding," Nomura said. The stock trades at 6.2 times 2013 earnings (consensus forecasts) compared with global large-cap peers which trade on a multiple of 11.7. The target price for the shares has been cut from 1,400p to 1,340p to reflect a lower expected silver price. However the new target still suggests around 45% upside to the current share price.

Investec has labelled cruise operator Carnival as a 'key sector pick', saying that the recent dip in the share price should be used as a buying opportunity; the target price is lifted from 2,500p to 3,000p. "We advise utilising Friday’s drop to invest in our sector key pick, with the group having: (1) an exceptional market position; (2) leading brands; (3) a resilient core customer demographic; (4) high repeat bookings; (5) emerging markets growth upside; and (6) benign industry supply growth with visibility of over four years," Hollins said.

Refinancing of Australian debt facilities 25 June 2012 ‐ GDF SUEZ and International Power (70% owned by GDF SUEZ) are pleased to announce the refinancing of debt facilities at the Hazelwood and Loy Yang B power plants in Australia. The refinancing of both facilities was completed in a challenging environment of continuing regulatory uncertainty around energy and carbon policy. The debt of A$652 million (€522 million) at the 1,542MW Hazelwood plant will be repaid from GDF SUEZ corporate resources. This repayment demonstrates the strength and flexibility of the GDF SUEZ balance sheet and delivers synergies to the Group, which were anticipated from the Combination between International Power and GDF SUEZ in February 2011. The existing facility for Hazelwood will be repaid in full on 29 June 2012. The debt at the 955MW Loy Yang B plant, co-owned with our partner Mitsui & Co., Ltd., has been refinanced with a syndicate of banks. Project finance debt of A$1.06 billion (€0.85 billion) with a tenor of five years, maturing 30 June 2017, was provided by the syndicate, comprising both existing and new members. The new debt facility was well supported, particularly by the Australian and Asia-Pacific banks.

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201206250700040063G

Analyst and investor visit The two areas of focus for today's visit will be our infrastructure business, particularly our involvement in London's Crossrail project, and our Property business. The presentations by senior management will demonstrate Kier's ability to deliver large, highly complex infrastructure projects and the breadth of our property services, highlighting the opportunities in these important sectors and the strength of our integrated business model. During the visit, any comments on trading will be consistent with the IMS and this announcement. Outlook The Group's trading performance remains in line with expectations. We have robust order books and a healthy cash position which, combined with our integrated business model, strong customer relationships and great people, positions the business well and enables us to maintain our progressive dividend policy, pursue our chosen growth markets and seek investment opportunities.

Services Trading is in line with expectations, and since the IMS, the division has achieved several contract wins that underpin its £2bn order book. As announced on 30 May 2012, the division has been appointed as the preferred bidder on three contracts with a total value of approximately £225m, which includes the five-year planned maintenance services contract for the housing group Circle and two five-year facilities management contracts for Hampshire County Council and Surrey County Council. In addition, the division has secured a maintenance contract for London Fire Brigade and facilities management contracts for Westminster Kingsway College and the Royal Automobile Club, with a combined value of approximately £30m. Property Property continues to provide good quality work to our other divisions and is trading well and in line with expectations. We have recently been confirmed as preferred bidder for the £50m PFI project to design, build and maintain 11 fire stations across the county for Staffordshire Fire and Rescue Service, which follows closely behind the £60m PFI project to provide similar facilities for the London Fire Brigade, announced in April. We have also started working on site at Sydenham on a fully pre-let retail park, valued at £58m. Following a number of successes this year, Property now has a development pipeline valued at approximately £750m. Our mixed-tenure housing business has recently qualified as a member of the Birmingham Municipal Housing Trust Developer Partner Framework, which has been established to deliver new build housing worth £1bn over the next three to four years, and our private housing business also remains on track to deliver in excessof 600 completions this year.

TRADING UPDATE 25 June 2012 Kier Group plc, the integrated construction, services and property group, is pleased to provide the following update on current trading in advance of today's analyst and investor visit in London. Current trading Trading remains in line with the Interim Management Statement issued on 17 May 2012 (IMS) with our order books for Construction and Services remaining robust and cash balances sustained at healthy levels. Construction Trading continues to be resilient with current operating margins above 2%. Our order book of secured and probable work represents 85% of our forecast Construction revenue for the 2013 financial year and the level of tender activity remains high across a range of public and private sector projects. These include new health frameworks across Wales and Scotland, in excess of £1.5bn of infrastructure schemes that we are bidding in the UK and significant activity in Hong Kong and the Middle East. The long awaited Priority Schools Building Programme (PSBP) to design and build educational facilities in England, has recently been confirmed, with the first £400m of projects now announced and being delivered through the Academies (II) Framework of which Kier is a member.

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201206250700100135G

.......................................Although India will remain the principal market for Essar Energy's expanded refinery capacity, there is expected to be an increase in exports from Vadinar in the short term to around 45% of sales due to new capacity being built by public sector refiners. Essar Energy expects demand to outstrip this new capacity within the next five years, and potentially earlier for products such as gasoil. Essar Energy welcomes the move to increase the quality of fuels in major urban areas to BS IV standard as this should increase domestic demand for higher quality products from the Vadinar refinery. Increased global demand, the earthquake in Japan and events in the middle-east and North Africa pushed up refining margins in the first half of 2011. The fourth quarter of 2011 saw weakening refining margins driven by a number of factors including weakening demand for gasoline and naphtha, lower light/heavy crude spreads and the re-introduction of Libyan crude to the market. Following on from this, a recovery in margins during January and February 2012 was followed by weakness in March. It is likely that margins will remain volatile throughout 2012, with ongoing weak growth in the Western world but robust demand in Asia..........................................................

Naresh Nayyar, Essar Energy Chief Executive Officer, said: "We are now very much an operational energy business, with many construction projects completed and our capex investment programme having peaked. The expansion of our Vadinar refinery has been very successful, putting the plant into a league with the best in the world where it can produce high value fuels from lower cost, ultra heavy crudes. Coupled with our low cost base, this will permit a step change in margins. We are also making good headway at our Stanlow refinery with a number of initiatives to improve margins by at least US$2 per barrel over the next 18 months." "In our power business we have commissioned 1,580MW of capacity since January 2011 and expect to commission a further 3,900MW in the next 24 months. We have been encouraged by the provisional forest clearance on the Mahan coal block which moves us further forward in developing the low cost generation assets which India badly needs. However, significant further progress is still required in a number of areas and we will be continuing our dialogue with both state and central Government to try and ensure this momentum is not lost."

RESULTS FOR 15 MONTHS TO MARCH 31 2012 EXCLUDING EXCEPTIONAL ITEMS 1(reflecting switch to March year end): · Strong group revenue growth up to US$22.0bn (2010 12 months: US$10.0bn), primarily due to higher refining and marketing revenues in India from higher selling prices and the Stanlow refinery acquisition · 14% depreciation of Rupee during 15 month period resulted in an overall forex impact of US$317 million1 on EBITDA2, including revaluation impact and other forex losses of US$243.2 million · Group Current Price (CP) EBITDA2 of US$737.1 million including sales tax benefit but before its subsequent reversal and before foreign exchange impact (2010: US$697.0 million) · Profit before tax and profit after tax before exceptional items of US$129.0 million (2010: US$365.5 million) and US$98.2 million (2010: US$248.3 million), respectively · Impact of exceptional items on profit before tax and profit after tax of US$1,276.7 million and US$862.5 million respectively · Loss before tax and loss after tax after impact of exceptional items of US$1,147.7 million and US$764.3 million, respectively

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201206250700120201G

Naresh Nayyar, Essar Energy chief executive, said: "The synchronisation of unit 1 at Vadinar P2 is another step forward for our power business and when it is commercially operational, this project will also improve margins at the refinery." Work is ongoing to prepare unit 2 at Vadinar P2, which is also 255MW, for synchronisation with the grid.

Essar Energy synchronises Vadinar P2 unit 1 with transmission grid June 25 2012: Essar Energy plc [LSE: ESSR], the India-focused integrated energy company, today announced that the first of two 255 megawatt units at its Vadinar Phase 2 (P2) power generation project in Gujarat state has been synchronised with the transmission grid. The coal fired Vadinar P2 project, with a total 510MW capacity, is one of three power plants being completed by Essar Energy during 2012. The 1,200MW Salaya I project has already been fully commissioned and is commercially operational, while the 1,200MW Mahan I project is expected to be synchronised shortly. Together these three projects will take Essar Energy's total installed capacity to 4,510MW. Most of the power generated by Vadinar P2 will be sold to Essar Oil's refinery at Vadinar, which will help improve margins at the oil refinery given the relative lower cost of coal-fired generation. Some power will also be sold to Essar Steel and some sold into the merchant market.

http://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201206250701010204G

Outlook We remain in challenging economic times in which companies will need to innovate to stay ahead. As I said at the beginning of this report, I believe that we are a company which is able to do so and that our strategy is the right one. In our ambitions to grow it is important we do not stretch ourselves too thin and we will therefore focus principally in the short term on our core geographical areas of the UK, Australasia, Oman and the UAE. I would like to thank management and staff for their ongoing contributions, and our shareholders for their continued support, as we look forward to continued growth in the current financial year.

Ken Scott, Chief Executive, ILX Group commented: "The ongoing economic uncertainty made this a challenging year, particularly in the UK. However, we have increased Group revenues and continue to see growth of our digital learning revenues, even in the UK. Our digital learning solutions and our technology platform provide a highly efficient and effective proposition. They deliver an enjoyable user learning experience and enable both organisational customers and consumers to obtain accreditation at excellent value for money. Demand for project and programme management skills and knowledge remains high, even in the current climate, and is expected to increase. ILX offer a cost effective, high quality interactive digital learning solution that meets this growing need. "

Financial Highlights · Revenues up 5% to £13.47 million (2011: £12.89 million) · Software revenues up 17% and comprise over 57% of Group revenues (2011: 51%) · Operating profit £1.01 million (2011: £1.73 million) · Adjusted PBT £0.96 million (2011: £1.54 million) · Adjusted earnings per share 2.49p (2011: 4.39p) · Bank debt refinanced with HSBC at reduced rates · £0.49 million investment in our digital learning products (2011: £0.48 million) · Net debt £2.25 million (2011: £1.89 million) · Dividend suspended to allow net debt to be reduced

PRELIMINARY RESULTS FOR THE YEAR ENDED 31 MARCH 2012 ILX Group plc (AiM: ILX), the AIM quoted provider of e-learning software and consulting services, announces its unaudited preliminary results for the year ended 31 March 2012. Corporate Highlights · Continued strong growth in Australian revenues · Software sales growth in the UK despite difficult market conditions · Global consultancy business developed · Leading position in PRINCE2 and Best Practice digital learning maintained · Subsidiaries established in New Zealand, Dubai, and Poland