Breaking News in association with Money AM

Thursday, 5th November 2009

Charter FY set to be ahead of forecasts

8:17am
International engineering group Charter says full year results could be ahead of forecasts made at its interims.

The group - which comprises ESAB, one of the world's leading welding companies, and Howden, a world leader in air movement equipment - said trading since July has been satisfactory.

It said that if current conditions continued, the Board envisaged an outcome for the full year which would be "somewhat ahead of their expectations at the time of reporting the first half results".

Story provided by Business Financial Newswire...

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Quintain plans 'transofrmational' £183.5m rights issue

8:17am
Quintain Estates plans to raise £183.5m net via a 3 for 1 rights issue at 49p per share, representing a 72% discount to the latest closing price.

The proceeds will initially be used to reduce the group's borrowings and strengthen its balance sheet.

The balance will be used to bring forward the next phases of the group's urban regeneration schemes at Wembley and Greenwich and invest in further opportunities.

CEO Adrian Wyatt said the rights issue was 'transformational, providing the means not only to reduce our debt still further and cushion...

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Charles Stanley pre-tax profits up 6.8% at £5.49m

8:17am

Story provided by Business Financial Newswire...

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Vedanta Resources hikes dividend

8:17am
India-based mining group Vedanta Resources reported revenue of $3bn for the half-year to end-September. EBITDA was $746m and EBITDA margin 25%. Basic EPS was 68.5 cents, supporting a proposed interim dividend of 17.5 cents per share, up 6%.

ROCE (excluding project capital work in progress) continued to be strong at 19% (annualised).

Vedanta said it raised $3.35bn in the year to date, and Capex was well funded.

The group reported a strong balance sheet with net debt of $969m and cash, cash equivalents and liquid investments of $6bn, with a further...

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Unilever sales grow while profits dip

7:47am
Household goods and healthcare conglomerate Unilever said underlying sales growth in the third quarter was 3.4%, with volume growth 3.6%. All regions and categories showed positive volumes. Q3 gross margin was up 290 bps.

Q3 turnover was down 2% at 10.201bn, with underlying sales growth of 3%.

Net profit in Q3 was 1,117bn, down 35%, while earnings per share fell 36% to 0.38.

The group's advertising and promotion spend increased by 130 bps, mainly additional advertising to support innovations and build brands. Overheads were up by 90 bps, mainly due to...

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