European Nickel (LON:ENK, ASX:ENK) has taken charge of its own destiny in moving its focus from the Caldag project in Turkey to its Acoje asset in the Philippines, according to Louise Collinge, mining analyst at Evolution Securities.
The company revealed today it is placing Caldag on care on maintenance as it waits for the government to sign off its forestry permit. ENK has decided instead to fast-track Acoje.
“While it is disappointing that the company has not yet received its essential Turkish forestry permit, we believe that it is doing the right thing in focusing its efforts in the Philippines given the significant delays,” Collinge said.
She remains a buyer of the stock with a price target of 55p. At 1.20 pm, the shares were 24.75p, down 7.5p or 23 percent.
HB Markets analyst Amisha Chohan said that S&U's (LON:SUS) business is well‐established, profitable and cash generative.
This morning S&U chairman Anthony Coombs described the period from August 1 to December 9 2010 as ‘solid’.
The company, which owns loansathome4u and Advantage Finance, said its motor finance operation is heading for a record year.
The debt quality of the business is strong and the number of “live accounts” rose by 12 percent.
“We believe the group will grow organically and via acquisitions,” Chohan said.
“The group is trading in line with current market expectations for the fiscal year ending January 2011.”
The analyst added: “S&U continues to be a yield play (prospective 2011: 6.1%) underpinned by stability of earnings.”
“We tipped S&U as a buy in our 'Thoughts for 2010' when the share price was 447.5p. The share price has almost reached our target price of 600p. We therefore adjust our recommendation to a ‘Hold’, but remind investors of the compelling and sustainable yield.”
Renovo’s (LON:RNVO) interim results could beat forecasts, according to Panmure Gordon analyst Savvas Neophytou.
Previewing the results, which are expected on Tuesday 14 December, Neophytou expects that Renovo will report revenues of £9.8 million.
He also highlighted that changes to the Juvista licensing deal with Shire Pharmaceuticals (LON:SHP) may provide some upside from this forecast.
“We expect Renovo to report H1 2010 revenues of £9.8 million in recognition of upfront and milestone payments from the licensing deal with its US partner Shire for its lead product candidate Juvista,” Neophytou said in a note to clients.
“Following the changes to its licensing agreement with Shire earlier this year, deferred royalty which is on the company’s balance sheet will be amortised to the company’s P&L in total by June 2011 which is why there could be some upside to our forecast of £9.8 million.”
The analyst stressed: “As ever financial results for a biotechnology stock are of limited value other than the cash position which we expect should be a strong £46 million.”
He also believes that accompanying news about Renovo’s development pipeline could also drive the stock higher.
The Panmure analyst rates Renovo a ‘buy’ with an 85 pence target.
“Juvista is a novel, first-in-class product for the improvement of scar appearance post surgery,” Neophytou said.
“It will be the first drug commercialised for this indication, with no near-term competitors.”
Neophytou believes that Juvista is the company’s main value driver, as it is targeting a potential multi-billion dollar market.
“Juvista remains the main value driver for the Renovo investment thesis and we are now entering a rich vein of newsflow regarding this candidate,” he said.
The analyst adds: “The reason for our positive stance on Juvista hinges on our analysis that if all clinical trials ran to date on Juvista are pooled, efficacy rates in the region of 35–40% improvement in Visual Analogue Scales (VAS) have been achieved.”
“The phase III REVISE trial has been designed to show a 21% improvement, which should be a relatively low hurdle rate, and another reason why we are confident that the primary endpoint of REVISE should be met.”