JD Wetherspoon sees profit drop by 11pc March 11, 2011 JD Wetherspoon reported an 11 per cent decline in first half pre-tax profit, blaming higher interest charges following the renewal of its bank facilities in March last year. The company, which has 787 pubs across Britain made a pretax profit of £32.2m in the half year to 23 January, down from £36.2m the year before. [...]
THE WEEK AHEAD March 6, 2011 COMPANY NEWS ● Ireland’s biggest bookmaker Paddy Power will announce its end of year results on Monday. ● So will the financial spread betting and CFD provider IG Group. Both will be betting on good results. ● On Tuesday, Weir Group, founded in 1981 by descendants of Robert Burns, will hope to have engineered strong [...]
HEDGE FUND MANAGERS GET A VERY RAW DEAL January 25, 2011 HEDGE fund managers rightly feel they are being persecuted by creeping EU legislation, which is suffocating their industry. But Hugh Hendry, a Scottish fund manager at Eclectica Asset Management, may be suffering from a touch of hyperbole. In the latest issue of Bloomberg Markets he likens the plight of the humble hedgie manager to the [...]
Wetherspoon’s Down to be Go-Ahead’s finance head January 24, 2011 THE FORMER JD Wetherspoon finance chief who shocked the pubs sector by quitting in October was yesterday unveiled as transport group Go-Ahead’s new finance director. Go-Ahead, which runs a fifth of London’s buses as well as the Southern and South Eastern rail franchises, is listed in the FTSE 250. He will replace Go-Ahead’s Nick Swift [...]
Wetherspoon has happy Xmas January 19, 2011 PUB operator JD Wetherspoon said yesterday sales grew in recent weeks despite the snow but warned profit margins were coming under pressure from the increasing cost of food, drink and other bills. Wetherspoon, which operates nearly 800 outlets, said like-for-like sales increased three per cent in the 12 weeks to 16 January, up from 1.6 [...]
Goldman earnings prompt FTSE sell-off January 19, 2011 A surprisingly sharp sell-off on the FTSE this afternoon pushed the index below the 6,000 mark, to close down 79.73 points or 1.32 per cent, at 5,976.70. A bigger than expected fall in earnings at leading US investment bank Goldman Sachs sparked a rout among investors across all sectors. Earlier in the day, more bad [...]
Wetherspoon sales growth accelerates January 19, 2011 JD Wetherspoon has reported accelerating sales growth in the second quarter of its fiscal year and said it was confident of a reasonable performance in 2011. The pub operator, which has nearly 800 premises across Britain, said sales at pubs open more than a year rose by three per cent in the 12 weeks to [...]
THE WEEK AHEAD January 16, 2011 COMPANY NEWS ● Several large American technology companies will report their results after UK trading hours on Tuesday, including Apple, IBM and Western Digital. ● As will remaining British retailers, including the fashion group Burberry and Carphone Warehouse. ● The budget pub chain JD Wetherspoon will release a trading update on Wednesday, as will bookmaker William [...]
THE TIPSTER January 16, 2011 DISCOUNT pub group JD Wetherspoon has a trading update due out on Wednesday that should offer some insight as to the impact bad weather had on sales in the pre-Christmas period. A degree of this has presumably been priced in already although broker sentiment does seem to be building against the stock. IG Index is [...]
What the other papers say this morning January 9, 2011 FINANCIAL TIMES GOLDMAN TEAM RAISES MONEY FOR NEW FUND The last big proprietary trading team at Goldman Sachs has begun raising money to start a new hedge fund independent of the bank, for launch in the second quarter of this year. The team – led by two senior members of Goldman Sachs’ Principal Strategies desk, [...]