Broker Spotlight - Mitchells & Butlers, BHP Billiton, Centamin, Cairn Energy, Acal, Fastjet...

Mitchells & Butlers (LON:MAB) has received a generally favourable reception after taking the City scribes on a site visit. Canaccord said that while it is easy to see that the pub group is valued too cheaply, it is harder to spot a catalyst that will change the situation. More momentum is need in its like-for-like performance to prove that its ‘long-game’ is working. “The restoration of a dividend would signal that the company is back to good health. “ ‘Buy’ with a 500p target repeats Canaccord. It is time to stop buying BHP Billiton (LON:BLT), according to Deutsche Bank, which has today downgraded the international mining major to ‘hold’. The German bank also reduced its price target to 1660p from 1800p, and said the company’s focus would turn to growing oil and copper business following the South32 demerger. Egyptian gold firm Centamin (LON:CEY) was also a downgraded mining firm on Tuesday, as RBC Capital cut its rating to ‘sector perform’ from ‘outperform’. In the oil sector, however, Jefferies lifted its recommendation for offshore firm Cairn Energy (LON:CNE) to ‘buy’ from ‘hold’ thanks to what analyst Mark Wilson calls a “play opening” success in Senegal. Elsewhere in the City it was largely a case of nudging the slide-rule rather that wholesale changes. Deutsche Bank repeats a ‘hold’ for defence specialist Ultra Electronics (LON:ULE) but the price target moves to 1800p from 1750p. JP Morgan Cazenove weighed in with commentary across various sectors, but there were no notable changes; AstraZeneca (LON:AZN), British American Tobacco (LON:BATS), First Group (LON:FGP), Greene King (LON:GNK), Land Securities (LON:LAND) and WPP (LON:WPP) all got a mention. Silence Therapeutics latest update from its pancreatic cancer clinical trials is that post-hoc analysis of a subset of patients with metastatic cancer (19 patients overall), showed a statistically significant difference. Higher dose recipients of Atu027 had longer progression free survival (PFS) of 5.33 months, compared to 1.81 months for those on the lower regimen. ‘Buy’ with a 442p price target. Distributor Acal (LON:ACL) remains a buy at finncap, with a target price of 339p after full year results came in ahead of expectations. EPS grew 31% on last year driven by strong sales growth and rising operating margins. Earnings should rise by 15% annually over the next two years. Airline fastjet (LON:FJET) saw substantial improvement in top line for the business from its base in Tanzania in 2014. On a rating of two times revenue, the current share rating is not particularly undemanding but the foundations are being put in place to grow the business into a pan-African low cost carrier.