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London midday: Banks keep Footsie ahead
Wed, 08 Feb, 2012
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London midday: Banks keep Footsie ahead
Fri, 12 Mar 2010, 12:20:00
Banks are driving Footsie upwards following a sluggish start. <b>Lloyds, Royal Bank of Scotland and Barclays</b> are all higher. Life groups <b>Old Mutual, Legal & General and Standard Life</b> are also in demand. <b>HSBC</b> is the exception among the financials after Goldman Sachs reduced its view to 'neutral' and removed it from its conviction-buy list saying it was puzzled by its weak performance relative to Standard Chartered. <b>BSkyB</b> is a lively market on talk that Rupert Murdoch is planning to the take the satellite broadcaster private. The Aussie/US tycoon owns 40% of BSkyB already. Analysts were sceptical of the rumour, though apparently there has been a large buyer for the shares recently. Housebuilders are strong on repeated chatter that consolidation is imminent.<b>Barratt</b> is the name mentioned most often, but the others are strong as well as today. <b>Bovis</b>, <b>Taylor Wimpey</b> and <b>Berkeley</b> are higher. In company news, global pharmaceuticals leviathan <b>GlaxoSmithKline</b> has dumped its remaining 4.5% holding in former subsidiary Maxygen. Glaxo said it no longer owns any shares in the US-based protein drug developer after selling its entire holding of 1.433m shares. <b>Liberty</b> has confirmed rumours it is talking to potential buyers after receiving approaches to take over the 134-year-old luxury department store group. Emissions exchange operator <b>Climate Exchange</b> saw 2009 revenues grow strongly to £33.61m from £22.78m in 2008, but sales were below expectations of £34.32m. The company swung back into the black, with a pre-tax profit of £2.15m, compared to a loss of £2.54m the year before, but analysts had been expecting a profit of £2.59m. Nightclub operator <b>Luminar</b> has instigated a 'rigorous' cost cutting plan after the recent cold snap added to what were already weak sales. For the financial year as a whole, same outlet sales were 9.9% below the previous year as a direct result of a reduction in customer numbers, it said. Upmarket cooker manufacturer <b>Aga</b> moved back in the black as sales picked up in the second half of the year. The group posted a profit of £0.5m for 2009, down from £14.4m last time, but a recovery from £2.4m loss at half-way. Sales for the year dropped from £279m to £245m. <b>Dragon Oil</b> has completed and carried out initial testing of the Dzheitune (Lam) A/142 and 13/143 development wells in Turkmenistan, its first two of the year. <b>Yule Catto</b>'s joint venture subsidiary, Revertex (Malaysia) has exchanged conditional contracts with HB Fuller Company for the sale of adhesives business Revertex Finewaters. Shares in <b>Discovery Metals</b> were wanted Friday after the miner published the assay results from drilling at the Boseto Copper Project located in north-west Botswana. Europe-focused oil exploration company <b>Nautical Petroleum</b> has secured the use of a rig for the drilling of the Catcher prospect in the UK Central North Sea. Drilling on the well, located in block 28/9, is expected to start in May. A sea-bed survey in January indicated that the well can be drilled using a heavy duty jack-up rig, and the use of just such a rig has now been secured.
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