26th Oct 2018 10:13
LONDON (Alliance News) - The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers within the main London indices on Friday.----------FTSE 100 - WINNERS----------International Consolidated Airlines Group, up 1.9%. The Anglo-Spanish group, which owns British Airways, Aer Lingus, Iberia, and Vueling, posted an increase in third-quarter profit, despite rising fuel costs and foreign exchange headwinds. For the three months to September 30, the company recorded pretax profit of EUR1.38 billion, up from a restated EUR1.23 billion pretax profit in the comparative quarter a year ago. On an adjusted basis, pretax profit was marginally down to EUR1.42 billion. Meanwhile, revenue for the third quarter jumped 8.5% to EUR7.14 billion from EUR6.58 billion a year ago. The company recorded a rise in both third-quarter non-fuel unit costs and fuel costs of 0.5% and 14.3%, respectively. Looking ahead, IAG expects to deliver an EUR200 million increase in operating profit before exceptional items for 2018. In 2017, operating profit totalled EUR2.95 billion. ----------FTSE 100 - LOSERS----------Royal Bank of Scotland Group, down 4.4%. Net interest margin was down by 8 basis points quarter-on-quarter to 1.93% reflecting one off items, continued competitive pressure and higher average liquidity balances. This was worse than analysts had expected. More positively for RBS, pretax profit in the three months ended September increased 10% to GBP961 million from GBP871 million the year before. RBS's third quarter total income increased 15% to GBP3.64 billion year-on-year, with net-interest income decreasing to GBP2.15 billion from GBP2.30 billion. The lender attributed the income increase to indemnity insurance recoveries of GBP272 million and lower disposal losses compared to the same period last year. RBS total assets at September 30 was GBP719.9 billion, down from GBP748.3 billion at June 30.----------WPP down 3.7%. Kepler Cheuvreux cut the advertising giant's rating to Hold from Buy after WPP on Thursday reported a drop in third quarter revenue due to slowdown in its North American businesses and said it intends to sell a stake in its market research unit Kantar Group.----------Glencore, down 2.2%. The miner lowered its guidance by 6% and now expects to deliver 4.6 million barrels of oil by the year-end due to a one-month unplanned stoppage at the Mangara field in Chad. The field is now back online and fully operational, the miner reported. Own-sourced copper production of 1.1 million tonnes in the three months to September 30 was up 12% on last year, while own-sourced cobalt production was 44% higher than last year at 28,500 tonnes. These boosts were, however, countered to some extent by reduced production at Prodeco in Colombia as additional overburden removal was carried out to optimise production and costs going forward. Entitlement interest oil production of 3.4 million barrels was 14% below last year, due to natural field decline in Equatorial Guinea.----------FTSE 250 - WINNERS----------888 Holdings, up 1.8%. Investec raised the gambling company's rating to Hold from Sell. ----------FTSE 250 - LOSERS----------ConvaTec Group, down 2.7%. UBS cut the medical products and technologies company's rating to Neutral from Buy. ----------OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - WINNERS----------Imaginatik, up 23%. The management software firm secured a GBP250,000 investment from Eight Capital Partners, and announced an open offer to raise a further GBP250,000, and the re-listing of its shares on London's AIM. Eight Capital's investment will form two parts: GBP160,000 will be invested immediately by subscribing for 14.5 million new shares at a price of 1.1p per share, which represents about 30% of Imaginatik. The second part will come through the acquisition of GBP90,000 of convertible loan notes to be issued by Imaginatik. The loan notes have a term of three years and an annual coupon of 7.5%, payable quarterly in arrears. Imaginatik will also look to raise another GBP250,000 through an underwritten open offer at the same price as the Eighth Capital placing. The proceeds of the open offer will be used to provide additional working capital for the company.----------Brooks Macdonald, up 2.6%. The investment management firm reported a quarter-on-quarter increase in total funds under management. Total group funds under management stood at GBP12.8 billion as at September-end, up 3.0% from GBP12.4 billion as at June-end. Year-on-year, assets increased by 16%. The rise in group assets was driven by net new business of GBP158 million and and investment performance of GBP211 million. The company's UK investment management division maintained a healthy 2.0% organic growth rate in the three months to the end of September and had total fund growth of 3.6% to GBP11.1 billion. The international division experienced net outflows of GBP52 million due to the departure of one of its client-facing teams.----------OTHER MAIN MARKET AND AIM - LOSERS----------Crawshaw Group, down 22%. The butcher confirmed it is considering a fundraising to restore growth and profitability. Crawshaw made the comments in response to recent media reports. The company also added it is considering a number of "remedial actions" to address the key issues it identified after concluding a review of the business, including an analysis of its high street presence. For the six months to July 29, the butcher posted revenue of GBP21.6 million and a pretax loss of GBP1.7 million, wider from a GBP1.2 million loss the year before. ----------HaloSource, down 18%. The water technology company guided for a widened annual loss and said it needs further funding to cover its business plans. For 2018, HaloSource expects a net loss of between USD7.0 million to USD7.5 million. A year ago, the firm posted a net loss of USD5.7 million. Revenue is expected in the range of USD2.0 million to USD2.5 million, flat on the prior year when it came in at USD2.0 million. The company said it believes that, given intervening trading, it has sufficient working capital to last until the end of 2018. Looking ahead, HaloSource said it is exploring ways to raise additional capital. It will need at least between USD4.0 million and USD5.0 million to fund its business plan for other 12 months. ----------