Proactive Investors -
- FTSE 100 climbs another 64 points
- Wheat prices jump after Russia pulls out of deal
- easyJet (LON:EZJ) reports record quarterly profit
London's movers
A quick glance at some of the movers in London today.
Fallers
Lookers- down 5.4% to 112.7p
Shares plunged on Thursday morning as the London-listed car dealer announced shareholder Cinch intended to block its proposed sale.
Having withdrawn a letter of intent to back Global Auto Holdings Limited's takeover of Lookers, 19.2%-stakeholder Cinch will now vote against the takeover.
“Lookers is re-engaging with other shareholders to understand whether [resolutions] to implement the acquisition are capable of being passed,” Lookers said.
Lansdowne Oil & Gas - down 30% to 0.12p
Shares were down in Thursday’s deals as the micro-cap Irish oil firm announced up to £200,000 of equity funding.
It intends to sell two tranches of new shares with an initial £60,000 raise, 60mln shares at 0.1p, alongside a conditional £140,000 to be raised at the same price, subject to shareholder approval at an EGM slated for 9 August.
Risers
GSTechnologies- up 76% to 0.86p
Fintech group GSTechnologies (LON:GST) crushed it on the London Stock Exchange today following news of its acquisition of PAYPT Finance, a Canadian company holding a Canadian Money Services Business (MSB) licence, clearly impressed investors.
Babcock- up 11% to 350p
Babcock (LON:BAB) topped the FTSE 250 leaderboard on what seemed a mixed full-year results.
Top-line numbers from the defence contractor were in line with expectations, said analysts at Liberum, though there was a £100mln hit on a Type 31 frigates contract with the Ministry of Defence, at the top of the previous guided range.
The Type 31 contract is being delivered amidst a dispute with the MoD due to cost overruns.
FTSE hits intraday high
The Footsie has just notched a new intraday high, up 64 points at 7652 as Wall Street traders wake up and prepare for the opening bell in New York.
London's blue-chip benchmark has retreated slightly from that level but is still up 56 points or 0.7% at almost 7,645.
Looking to the US, the futures indications are mixed, with the Dow Jones heading for a 0.1% improvement that would mark its ninth positive session in a row if it can be maintained, while S&P 500 futures are pointing to a 0.1% dip and the tech-powered Nasdaq a 0.6% reverse.
As a reminder, the Nasdaq is up almost 40% so far this year, the S&P 20% and the Dow 6%.
Disappointment about earnings from Tesla and Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX), among others, is behind the Nasdaq's expected retreat today.
More earnings are flowing on Thursday, with IBM (NYSE:IBM) mixed, Johnson & Johnson positive and United Airlines also impressing, Travellers, American Airlins and Blackstone (NYSE:BX) are also among those reporting before the opening bell.
Three-quarters of the S&P 500 companies that have announced earnings so far have topped estimates, according to FactSet data, which has created optimism about a soft landing for the US economy.
With that in mind, investors will also be keeping an eye on the latest US weekly jobless claims numbers and existing home sales data due out today.
Market analyst Craig Erlam at Oanda says: "Equities have performed extremely well recently as economic data has been more promising and the banks kicked off earnings season positively. Perhaps that's just lifted expectations a little too much and we're seeing some profit-taking going into the end of the week."
CMA tells supermarkets to be clearer on prices
The UK competition regulator says high food price inflation is not down to "weak retail competition" but has demanded that supermarkets comply with its guidance on 'unit pricing', ie how much individual items cost, to allow shoppers to compare between different chains.
Further probing from the Competition & Markets Authority (CMA) will examine competition and prices across the supply chain for the product categories identified, with it adding that rules on unit pricing "should be tightened and retailers must comply".
Investigating for the past two months, the CMA said its assessment is that "retail competition is working in the UK grocery sector", particularly between big supermarkets such as Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s and Tesco (LON:TSCO) as well as discounters, including Aldi and Lidl.
"Although food price inflation is at historically high levels, evidence collected to date by the CMA indicates that competition issues have not been driving this," it said.
This was based on operating profits in the grocery sector falling 41.5% compared to last year, it said, while average operating margins fell from 3.2% to 1.8%.
"This is due to retailers’ costs increasing faster than their revenues, indicating that rising costs have not been passed on in full to consumers."
Now that some input costs are starting to fall (though global food prices have been falling for many months), the CMA said "there are some signs that grocery retailers are planning to start rebuilding their profit margins" and it promised to monitor this in the months ahead.