Ocado sees slim profit as it seals Carrefour deal June 27, 2011 Online grocery delivery company Ocado has announced a deal to sell products supplied by French supermarket giant Carrefour, while reporting a small half-year profit. Its new Carrefour range will be in addition to its Waitrose lines. In the six months to 15 May, Ocado made a pre-tax profit of £200,000, compared with a loss of [...]
THE WEEK AHEAD in association with GFT June 26, 2011 COMPANIES ● Today, Ocado releases its half-year results. Its share price suffered last week on the back of JP Morgan Cazenove cutting its rating and the news that Waitrose is gearing up to compete with it directly in London. ● Tomorrow, Daisy will deliver its preliminary earnings release. The company sells internet and telecommunications services. [...]
Ocado hit by broker downgrade June 23, 2011 Shares in online shopping service Ocado tumbled by more than six per cent after JPMorgan Cazenove downgraded its rating for the shares and J Sainsbury hired the group’s head of retail Jon Rudoe to run its online operation. JPMorgan downgraded its rating on the online retailer to “neutral” from “outperform”. But the broker added: “We [...]
RISING STAR OF THE YEAR | THE SHORTLIST DAY 2 June 20, 2011 LUCKILY for all of us the City is full of rising stars, people we all think will make it to the top. This year’s selection includes Sam Smith, who has been making waves as head of the small cap broker finnCap. We’ve chosen two high-flying lawyers, one investment analyst and a fast rising star from [...]
Hugh Osmond snaps up power firm APR in deal worth £527m June 13, 2011 HUGH Osmond, the entrepreneur behind Pizza Express and Punch Taverns, is to buy US temporary power provider APR energy in an $855m (£527m) deal. Horizon Acquisition, a cash shell that Osmond floated on the alternative investment market in February 2010, announced yesterday that it will pay $395m cash and $495m in shares for a 59 [...]
London IPO market is close to seizure June 7, 2011 GLENCORE recently pulled off a $11bn flotation, London’s largest ever, but the past few months have otherwise been pretty desultory in terms of new companies coming to market. Some blame last year’s flotation of Ocado, the online grocer, for starting the rot. Ocado’s share price has recovered well from its early post-IPO malaise but bankers [...]
Ocado tumbles after sales slowdown May 11, 2011 OCADO led the FTSE 250 fallers yesterday, with its shares dropping over nine per cent after it admitted its sales were checked by capacity constraints. Ocado’s growth slowed from 24 per cent in its first-quarter to 18 per cent in the last three months. It says it expects sales to grow by 21 per cent [...]
HSBC drags FTSE back as investors eye inflation forecasts May 11, 2011 Banking giant HSBC sapped some of the confidence from the blue chip index today as it announced that it was aiming to slash costs by £2.1bn. The news followed a bruising start to the week for banks who have already earmarked billions for potential payouts over dubious insurance protection sales. HSBC fell 1.3 per cent [...]
New issues strive to win back trust May 10, 2011 What should we make of the London market for new issues, where private companies appeal for funds from equity investors such as BlackRock, Gartmore and the sovereign wealth houses? Currently we have the spectre of Glencore, the commodities trading group, almost effortlessly getting away an $11bn (£6.7bn) fund-raising, while smaller, less well known companies fail [...]
Waitrose takes the challenge to Ocado with warehouse opening April 20, 2011 WAITROSE is setting itself up to directly compete with Ocado, by opening a massive “virtual shop” in west London to step up the delivery of orders from its website in the capital. Waitrose will use the the warehouse in Acton to store goods ready for dispatch. The supermarket has a clause in its contract with [...]