12th Jan 2015 11:12
LONDON (Alliance News) - The following is a summary of top news stories Monday.
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COMPANIES
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Shire said it has agreed to acquire the US's NPS Pharmaceuticals for USD46.00 per share in cash, in a deal worth a total of USD5.2 billion. The Dublin-based pharmaceutical giant said the acquisition has been approved unanimously by the boards of both Shire and NPS Pharmaceuticals. Shire said it expects the deal to add to non-generally accepted accounting principles earnings per share from 2016 onward. The acquisition will be effected by a tender offer and be funded from Shire's cash resources, as well as existing and new bank facilities. The deal comes just three months after the collapse of a GBP32 billion takeover of Shire by US-based AbbVie Inc.
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AstraZeneca said its biologics research and development arm MedImmune has inked a licensing deal with privately held biotechnology firm Omnis Pharmaceuticals. Under the deal MedImmune has a license to develop, and if successful, commercialise Omnic's lead oncolytic virus programme.
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Housebuilder Taylor Wimpey reported strong growth in completions and average selling prices for 2014, and said it is entering 2015 with a record order book, giving it confidence in its prospects as it starts the first year of its new medium-term target period. In a statement, Taylor Wimpey said it completed 12,454 homes in 2014, up 6% from 11,696 in 2013, and it achieved an average selling price of GBP234,000, up 11% from GBP210,000 a year earlier. It said its order book stood at nearly GBP1.40 billion at the end of 2014, up 12% from GBP1.25 billion a year earlier.
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Royal Bank of Scotland Group is looking to put most of its Asian corporate banking business up for sale, Bloomberg reported citing a person familiar with matter. The report said that the Chief Executive Officer Ross McEwan would be holding a series of meetings in Singapore on Sunday to consider ways to scale back the lender's Asian business. The lender said last month that it's shutting its Japanese trading business. Quoting the person, the report indicated that the bank has about 2,000 employees in the Asia-Pacific region that could be affected. RBS would probably keep some operations in Singapore offering clients dollar, euro and yen fixed-income products.
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Shares in Afren dropped by around a fifth, hitting a near six-year low, after the company said it is considering its options for the Barda Rash field in the Kurdistan region of Iraq after the reserve estimate for the prospect was revised down substantially. Afren said an updated competent person's report on the Barda Rash field is expected to show a material reduction to its previously-published estimates on reserves and resources. The explorer said it expects the total reserve estimate for the field to be revised down to 250 million barrels of oil from 1.24 billion barrels previously. The downgrade has been made due to the reprocessing of 3D seismic surveys undertaken in 2012 and processed in 2013, alongside results of its most recent drilling campaign.
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Online domestic appliances retailer AO World said website revenue rose 38% in its fiscal third quarter which includes the key Christmas trading period, with sales spiking around Black Friday but remaining strong in the run-in to the festive season. It added that it remains confident that it will meet full-year expectations. In a statement, the retailer said website revenue was up 38% on the year in the three months to end-December, while total revenue, which includes third-party retail and logistics, rose 26%.
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The Unite Group said it has acquired a development site, subject to planning, in the centre of Coventry, and plans to build a home for about 280 students in time for the 2017/18 academic year. In a statement, the student accommodation company said the scheme is expected to achieve returns in line with Unite's targets for regional development and the total development cost, including the cost of the land, is expected to be approximately GBP13 million. It said the scheme will continue to drive its earnings visibility and net asset value growth.
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MARKETS
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London stocks are broadly higher, shrugging off a slide in Brent crude to a new five-and-a-half year low amid continued focus on December's mixed US jobs report which saw strong employment gains and an upward revision to November's figures but a slowdown in wage growth.
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FTSE 100: up 0.4% at 6,528.73
FTSE 250: up 0.04% at 16,018.09
AIM ALL-SHARE: up 0.5% at 706.81
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Brent crude is quoted at around USD48.74 a barrel after touching a new five-and-a-half year low of USD48.52 early Monday.
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GBP-USD: down at USD1.5120
EUR-USD: down at USD1.1796
GOLD: down at USD1220.42 per ounce
OIL (Brent): down at USD48.74 a barrel
(changes since end of previous GMT day)
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ECONOMICS AND GENERAL
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The Chancellor is working on an emergency UK tax cut in a bid to reverse the decline in investment in the North Sea, The Sunday Times reported. George Osborne told the paper that "more action" is needed to boost the industry after the fall in the oil price to USD49 per barrel, down 57% in the last six months. The fall in the oil price has resulted in a sharp fall in North Sea drilling and a slew of job and pay cuts. "I don’t want to pre-empt the budget but I can see that may well involve further reducing the burden of tax on investment in the North Sea," said Osborne.
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The British economy expanded at a slower pace in the fourth quarter, results of a survey by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, or NIESR, showed Friday. According to the NIESR GDP estimate, Quarter-on-quarter GDP growth slowed to 0.6% in the fourth quarter from 0.7% in the third quarter. The NIESR said that GDP grew 2.6% annually in 2014. This follows a 1.7% rise in 2013.
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The euro area region is set to expand moderately in the first and second quarters of 2015, a joint report published by statistical offices in France and Italy and Germany's Ifo Institute said. Gross domestic product is forecast to grow 0.3% each in the first and second quarters, mainly driven by domestic demand. Investment is set to pick up moderately. It is forecast to grow 0.2% in the first quarter and 0.3% in second quarter. The appreciation of the dollar vis-a-vis the euro will enhance external trade, the report said. Despite low inflation, consumption is likely to evolve at the same speed as GDP, up 0.3% per quarter in the first half of 2015.
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Ireland's construction sector maintained its strong growth momentum at the end of the year, as new orders continued to expand sharply, survey data from Markit Economics showed. The Ulster Bank Construction Purchasing Mangers' index fell slightly to 63.1 in December from 63.5 in the previous month. Any reading above 50 indicates expansion in the sector. The average reading for 2014 as a whole was the highest since the series began in mid-2000.
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Japan's government raised the economic growth estimates marginally for the fiscal year 2015. The real economic growth is estimated to reach 1.5% compared to the prior forecast of 1.4%, the Cabinet Office said. In nominal terms, GDP is forecast to rise 2.7%, slightly below the previous estimate of 2.8%.
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Europe, the US and Canada will step up their fight against terrorism and do more to tackle the challenge posed by foreign fighters in the wake of this week's attacks on Paris, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said Sunday. "We are determined to fight together against terrorism," he said after hosting talks in Paris with US Attorney General Eric Holder, Canadian Public Safety Minister Steven Blaney and ministers from 10 other European countries facing the issue of Western citizens returning from fighting in foreign Islamist campaigns.
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More than 3.7 million people took to the streets of France on Sunday to honour the 17 victims killed in the terrorist attacks that rocked the country in the past week. Joining the march in Paris were 40 world leaders, who locked arms in a show of unity against terrorism and extremism.
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Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras promised Saturday that he has a plan to create 770,000 new jobs by 2021 should he be returned to office in snap elections later this month. He made his comments in a campaign speech televised nationally. The promised jobs would be in seven key areas, including tourism, shipping, agriculture and pharmaceuticals. They would pump up Greek gross domestic product by EUR54 billion. Greece's unemployment rate currently stands at about 26%. Samaras also promised tax relief and a reform of the social welfare system.
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Indonesian Navy divers on Monday retrieved the flight data recorder from the AirAsia plane that crashed last month with 162 people on board, the search chief said. "At 7.11 am the search team managed to lift a part of the black box, namely flight data recorder," said Bambang Sulistyo, the head of the National Search and Rescue Agency. The device was wedged beneath a wing of the aircraft, he said. The cockpit voice recorder had not been found, Bambang said.
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By Arvind Bhunjun; [email protected]; @ArvindBhunjun
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Related Shares:
AstrazenecaRBS.LTaylor WimpeyShireUniteAo WorldAFR.L