Irish engineering firm Mincon Group PLC (LON:MCON) provided some cheer with its half-year report.
Profit before tax rose 24% to €7.82mln from €6.32mln the year before on the back of a 19% increase in total revenue to €55.72mln.
The company, which specialises in the design and manufacture of rock drilling tools, also sells tools made by third parties but is in the process of phasing these out “where that makes commercial sense”.
As one might expect, the margin on the products it manufactures itself are higher than third-party ones.
“Profit margins continue to recover across the entire set of businesses, even as demand reaches levels we have not encountered before,” the company said.
The shares were up 6.3% at 151.5p.
TomCo Energy Plc’s (LON:TOM) shareholders have been encouraged by some directors buying some shares.
Demonstrations of faith – albeit not exactly on the grand scale – by executive chairman Andrew Jones and chief executive John Potter were enough to send TomCo’s share price surging 13.4% to 5.50p.
Both directors spent about £1,500 topping up their holdings.
Jones’s stake rose to 38,146 shares, equivalent to 0.06% of the issued share capital of the company, while Potter, who had no TomCo shares prior to the purchase, now has 26,500 (0.04%).
Potter took over as chief executive in February of this year.
Chemring to count the cost of fatal explosion at its Countermeasures factory
Chemring Group PLC (LON:CHG) saw its shares drop on Monday after the explosion at its Chemring Countermeasures facility near Salisbury last Friday.
The group said the explosion, which left one person dead and another badly injured, has caused damage to parts of the factory's manufacturing operations and production is currently suspended.
A 29-year-old Southampton man has died in an explosion at a military factory - Chemring Countermeasures in Salisbury. A 26-year-old Pewsey man is seriously ill in hospital. An investigation is now underway into what caused the blast. pic.twitter.com/n406mZDerQ
— BBC Wiltshire (@BBCWiltshire) August 11, 2018
A detailed analysis of the possible impact of the incident on the group's financial prospects has begun but the firm said it expects the impact will lower the firm’s underlying operating profit for the current year by £10mln to £20mln.
The shares were down 14%.
Echo Energy Plc (LON:ECHO) faded in the morning trading session after reporting a few challenges with its ELM-1004 well at the Fracción C project in Argentina.
The operator has found it difficult to completely isolate all of the well’s interpreted gas bearing zones so is now considering stimulation options.
The shares were down 2.45p at 14.40p in morning trading.
Strewth! Sheilas' Wheels firm could be going private
Insurers drove higher in late morning trading after esure Group PLC (LON:ESUR) revealed that it was “minded to recommend” a takeover proposal from private equity firm Bain Capital.
The FTSE 250-listed home and motor insurer said that following discussions and a period of due diligence, Bain Capital had submitted a bid proposal of 280p in cash for each esure share, a 37% premium to last Friday’s closing price.
FTSE 250-listed esure shares shot nearly 30% higher to 265p, while blue-chip insurers Direct Line Insurance Group PLC (LON:DLG) and Admiral Group PLC (LON:ADM) were both up around 1.5% at 327.9p and 2,013p respectively.
esure reports its first-half results on Tuesday, and Admiral's numbers follow on Wednesday.
Brokers giveth and brokers taketh away
Broker comment was proving a double-edged sword for some blue-chips on Monday morning.
Morgan Stanley gave a boost to BAE Systems PLC (LON:BA.), upgrading its rating for the FTSE 100-defence and civilian aircraft contractor to ‘overweight’ from ‘equal-weight’ following recent first-half results.
The US investment bank also hiked its target price for the FTSE 100-listed firm to 750p from 550p, with the stock currently changing hands at 629.8p each, up 0.7% on Friday's close.
Bookmaker Paddy Power Betfair PLC (LON:PPB) was upgraded last Friday by Credit Suisse to ‘neutral’ from 'underperform’ but today Citi downgraded the stock to ‘sell’ from ‘neutral’, due to weaker than expected growth in its online business and a poor showing from its Australian division.
The bank cut its exchange revenue growth forecasts for the FTSE 100-bookmaker to -1% per annum from +2% previously, as it reduced its forecasts for the online business to reflect “operational deleverage in PPB’s online business from declining exchange revenues, given limited variable costs associated with the exchange”.
The shares slumped 195p to 7,060p, heading towards Citi’s target price, which was cut to 6,900p from 7,700p.
Rough seas for maritime services provider Ocean Wilsons and contract research organisation Fusion Antibodies
Brazilian maritime services provider Ocean Wilsons Holdings Limited (LON:OCN) has had a real problem with the Brazilian currency this year.
In its trading update in the first half of 2018, the company noted the Brazilian Real was 17% lower against the US dollar at the end of June compared to its level at the end of 2017.
That contributed to a 4% fall in operating profit to US$46.8mln from US$48.9mln in the same period of 2017.
“The depreciation of the Brazilian Real "BRL" against the US Dollar "USD" affected both our revenue in USD terms and bottom line earnings in the period,” noted José Francisco Gouvêa Vieira, Ocean Wilsons’ chairman.
The company’s performance was also affected by the knock-on effects of a nationwide strike by lorry drivers.
The shares sank 11.3% to 1,100p in early deals.
One of our deep discount to NTA holdings which has recently perked up a bit, but discount widened! Few interesting snippets in the presentation. Triple discount play. Ocean Wilsons +20% in a month as Wilson Sons +16% on container terminal assets review https://t.co/oMEj7dEokg
— Andrew Brown (@abroninvestor) August 9, 2018
The heaviest faller in early deals, however, was Fusion Antibodies PLC (LON:FAB), the contract research organisation.
The shares lost around a quarter of their value as the company reported that trading since the end of March had been slower than expected and that results for the current financial year would be “significantly behind current market expectations”.
Proactive news headlines:
Rockfire Resources PLC (LON:ROCK) told investors it has added material acreage to Rockfire's already significant ground-holding in Queensland. It has secured the Kookaburra Exploration Permit which spans a 232 square kilometre area with gold and copper prospectivity, including the Brigalow alluvial goldfield.
IXICO PLC (LON:IXI) has secured an agreement to expand the scope of an existing clinical trial study contract with a top 10 pharmaceutical company.
SIMEC Atlantis Energy Ltd (LON:SAE) believes its 220 megawatt (MW) Uskmouth power station in Wales could become the blueprint for future conversions around the world. Uskmouth is currently set up as a coal-fired power station, but SIMEC Atlantis is converting it to run on end-of-waste energy pellets – derived from a mixture of biogenic material and plastics that cannot be recycled.
Hydrogen fuel cell developer ITM Power PLC (LON:ITM) said its plans to expand the workforce and production capacity are on track. The company ended the year to April 30, with cash of £20.4mln after a successful fund-raising in December of last year.
Sound Energy PLC (LON:SOU) has sharpened investor attention as it announced that mobilisation has now begun for its first new well for the Tendrara project area in Morocco. The company, in a stock market statement, said that the National 110 IE (1500HP) land drilling rig owned by Saipem is now on its way to the location of the TE-9 well pad, which is currently under construction.
Echo Energy PLC (LON:ECHO) told investors that it is now considering stimulation options for the ELM-1004 well, at the Fracción C project in Argentina, after the first testing operation in its programme was compromised. The company, in a stock market statement, said that the operator has found it challenging to completely isolate all of the well’s interpreted gas bearing zones.
United Oil & Gas PLC (LON:UOG) appears impressed with the first ‘fast-track’ data from the recently shot 3D seismic across the Walton-Morant licence, offshore Jamaica. Specifically, the explorer said the high-grade Colibri target, previously mapped in 2D seismic, has been clearly identified.