You might think that with the success of “The Great British Bake Off” that demand for shop-made baked goods would flag, but apparently not.
Results from hot snacks peddler Greggs (LON:GRG) showed the group trading ahead of expectations, helped by its policy of changing the products on offer throughout the day.
Put simply, this probably means pushing coffee, porridge, omelettes and bacon butties in the morning, and Chelsea buns and tea at tea-time.
Best known for its sausage rolls and Cornish pasties – not least when a public school-educated politician is looking for a photo opportunity to show he is “down with the plebs” – the bakery chain will also be able to offer peri peri chicken flatbread the next time a campaigning politician just happens to pop in, trailed by a posse of paparazzi.
Should said campaigning politician be in need of a stiff drink after mixing with hoi polloi in Greggs, chances are Diageo (LON:DGE) has a brand that would be fit for purpose.
The company is in the news after poaching its new chief financial officer, Kathryn Mikells, from office equipment firm Xerox.
Mikells replaces Deirdre Mahlan, and while not a carbon copy – or even a Xerox copy – it is good to see a FTSE 100 company represented on the board by at least one woman.
Elsewhere in the booze sector, SABMiller (LON:SAB) has brought its trading update forward, and some might say it has done so because it wants to up the ante in its merger discussions with its bigger rival Anheuser Busch Inbev.
On the other hand, the shares are down 2.7% so maybe the ploy backfired, or it could be because there are fears that SABMiller’s board, which was said to be amenable to a takeover when news of a possible bid first broke, may now be veering towards staying independent.
“Media reports indicate the chairman and board are moving towards fighting the bid, while tobacco firm Altria is also reported to be unhappy, given its 27% stake in SABMiller has provided a hefty slice of income over the years,” writes Chris Beauchamp, a market analyst at spread betting firm IG.
Beauchamp’s web post also contains a chart that looks like how a map of the London Underground might look in a two-dimensional world, and comes with a health warning that any short position comes with a health warning: any hint that the deal is back on, or that the board’s objections will prove in vain, and the buyers would be back in control, Beauchamp notes.
Among the small caps, private investors are clicking on stories relating to Software Radio Technology (SRT), the splendidly named Nomad Foods and President Energy.
SRT’s (LON:SRT) trading update left the shares all at sea, as the provider of maritime domain awareness technologies – also known as “where the heck am I?” technologies – posted a half-year loss of £700,000.
Nomad (LON:NHL), which disappointingly does not produce foods made from yaks, camels and oxen, was sharply higher after revealing it is closer to acquiring the continental European business of frozen foods giant Findus.
Findus, of course, should have been the name chosen by Software Radio Technology, but it had already been taken.
President Energy (LON:PPC) is little changed after agreeing to acquire the remaining 36% of the Pirity concession in Paraguay that it doesn’t already own.
The company is paying US$500,000 in cash, with US$200,000 paid up front, and it will have to pay a 3% royalty on future profits from the project and may have to pass on up to US$2.7mln of back costs should President do a farm-out deal at Pirity.