ANALYST VIEWS: HAVE MAJESTIC’S RESULTS BEATEN YOUR FORECASTS? June 13, 2011 JOHN DICKINSON | BREWIN DOLPHIN Profit before tax was £0.7m ahead of our estimate, which was at the top of expectations. Majestic has built a good branded business in a competitive market and benefited from the demise of a lot of its competitors. We expect to raise our current year PBT estimate by £0.5m on [...]
ANALYST VIEWS: HOW BAD WAS THE PERFORMANCE OF ARGOS? June 9, 2011 TOM GADSBY | MATRIX GROUP These are pretty dire figures. We expected another tricky quarter for Argos, but the like-for-like sales fall is well below the expected range. While the decline in profits over the past two years is cyclical rather than structural, a clear upturn in consumer demand would be needed for the shares [...]
FESTIVALS KING TO FLOAT FIRM ON AIM June 8, 2011 RELIEF at Music Festivals, the new live music venture from Mean Fiddler founder Vince Power, which will this morning announce its intention to achieve a £10m valuation by floating on the alternative investment market (AIM). So no more sleepless nights at Merchant Securities, the adviser on the deal, after Power managed to raise the £6.5m [...]
ANALYST VIEWS: WHAT WOULD A SALE OF SYNOVATE MEAN FOR AEGIS? June 6, 2011 STEVE LIECHTI | INVESTEC We see Synovate as a decent add-on to existing players rather than a strategically exciting asset, therefore while an auction might develop, we would not encourage this view. Bigger questions are what Aegis does with any possible proceeds or whether this stimulates interest in the whole group by third parties, bearing [...]
ECONOMISTS’ VIEWS: IS IT TIME TO START NORMALISING INTEREST RATES? June 5, 2011 PATRICK MINFORD | CARDIFF BUSINESS SCHOOL “Yes, because more easing will be counterproductive. They have to accept that there’s an environment of slow growth now. The danger is the Bank could push sterling down even more, by staying loose while the rest of the world tightens, resulting in longer-term inflationary effects.” SIMON WARD | HENDERSON [...]
PADDY POWER BLOWS £11K DERBY WINNINGS OVER THREE-DAY STAG June 5, 2011 THE QUEEN was not amused by her loss at the Investec Derby, for which City A.M. proudly served as the official newspaper. But Paddy Power, the public face of the bookmaker of the same name, was still celebrating on Sunday afternoon after winning £11,000 the previous day. Power told his wife Jane he would make [...]
‘He’s only 19’: Pour Moi trainer sticks up for Barzalona June 5, 2011 INVESTEC Derby-winning trainer Andre Fabre has defended 19-year-old jockey Mickael Barzalona for beginning his celebration before he had clinched a famous victory in Saturday’s Classic at Epsom. The precocious Barzalona stood up in his riding irons and saluted the 120,000-strong crowd as Pour Moi neared the end of a race in which he put the [...]
CARLTON HOUSE GETS GREEN LIGHT June 3, 2011 BUT KIEREN FALLON STILL SWEATING ON LATE COURT DECISION Carlton House, the horse bidding to give the Queen her very first Derby winner, was last night finally given the green light to line-up on Epsom Downs this afternoon. The favourite for the world’s premier horse race has reportedly fully recovered from an injury he picked [...]
Derby Day is unique June 3, 2011 At 4pm this afternoon you will hear the deafening roar that greets the start of the greatest flat race in the world, as Britain’s biggest one day sporting crowd signal the start of the Investec Derby, one of the world’s iconic sporting moments. It is quite simply spine tingling! Marketing and promoting this occasion is [...]
Welcome to London’s business paper June 3, 2011 WELCOME to our first ever Saturday edition to celebrate the greatest and most exciting sporting event of the year. Here at City A.M., we are truly passionate about the Investec Derby as well as horse-racing in general. Our growing numbers of readers in and around London work very hard – but they also love to [...]