NEW! Investment Companies Centre
- Login to your account
- Free Membership to Digital Look
- Site Map
- Company A-Z
- Finance A-Z
- News Archive
- Events
- Give Us Feedback
Digital Look
- News Archive
- News Maps / Most Popular
- Expert Views
- Press Centre
- Market Reports
- Company News
- Small Caps News
- New Issues
- Economic News
- International News
- Commodities News
- Currencies News
- Bonds News
- Regulatory News
- Strategy Articles
- Technical Analysis Articles
- Investment Companies News
Virgin Credit Card:
London midmorning: Footsie slide continues
Related Companies
Related Indices
Related Sectors
News for Spread Betters
Previous
There's a new Investor Edition of CMC Markets' spread betting platform... and it's exclusive to DigitalLook.com users...
Date: Tuesday 01 Jul 2008
- Market Movers
- techMARK 1,350.26 -1.64%
- FTSE 100 5,468.60 -2.80%
- FTSE 250 8,886.20 -2.84%
LONDON (ShareCast) - London’s slide has continued, leaving only the telecoms groups BT and Vodafone and the household products giant Reckitt Benckiser in the blue.
Oil stocks are only slightly lower, with the high crude price helping them hold out against the more serious declines seen elsewhere in Footsie. BP and the oil services groups Petrofac and John Wood Group are slightly lower but still among the top 10 performers. The latter was helped by JP Morgan upgrading its rating on the stock to ‘neutral’ from ‘underweight’ and lifted its price target to 510p from 390p
British Airways and cruise operator Carnival are down with the oil price.
Next falls back after HSBC lowered its target price on the fashion chain to 1,100p from 1,280p
Moving to mid-caps, struggling housebuilder Barratt Developments is the early focus as the Telegraph reported it is close to securing a rescue refinancing with lenders that will relax its banking covenants and help it ride out the property downturn. It made strong early gains though has given some of these back.
Insurers are weak led by Prudential and Old Mutual, while banks are down again with Barclays and Royal Bank of Scotland under pressure.
UBS has begun coverage on UK bookmakers William Hill and Ladbrokes with respective ‘buy’ and ‘sell’ ratings.The broker has a 300p price target on William Hill and a 310p price target on Ladbrokes.
Manitowoc, the American industrials group, last night emerged as victor in a long-running takeover tussle for Enodis, the UK food equipment maker, beating its US rival, Illinois Tool Works.
Music, films and games retailer HMV is ahead of schedule in its recovery programme after a strong set of full-year results. Profit before tax and exceptional items from continuing operations grew 25.2% to £56.6m in the year to 26 April 2008 from £45.2m the year before. Total sales growth from continuing operations was 11.3%, with like-for-like sales up 7.3%.
Mail order group N Brown increased revenues by 12.3% in the 17 weeks ended 28 June 2008, a slight rise from the rate up until April. Sales were particularly strong during the sunny spell in May, which coincided with the mailing of summer catalogues. The growth in sales continues to be broadly based across various customer and product groups, it added.
Contractor Morgan Sindall has warned the prolonged slow down in the commercial property and open market housing sectors will impact its expectations for 2009, though it remains on track to meet its expectations for 2008. Sindall has experienced increasingly challenging market conditions over the last quarter.
Carpetright's profits fell from £67m to £59.5m last year with the carpet retailer adding it was more challenging than anticipated with the deteriorating economic environment, a decline in consumer confidence and a reduction in housing transactions having adverse impacts on revenue. "We remain cautious about the short-term prospects," it added.
Van hire company Northgate profits for the 12 months to next April will be flat due to weaker conditions in the used vehicle market. Profit before tax for the year to April rose 5% to £79.5m (2007 - £75.4m).
Electric power group Tanfield crashed on a warning trading is at a significantly lower level than previously forecasted with a "marked slowing" in its markets throughout June. As a result it will not meet the market's expectations for the year.