Broker Upgrades and Downgrades & Key UK Corporate Snapshots 26 January 2016

UK Broker Upgrades / Downgrades

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1PM Plc (OPM.L) Announced, in its independently reviewed interim results for the six months ended 30 November 2015, that its revenue stood at £5.3 million, compared to £2.6 million in the preceding period. Profit after tax was £1.3 million compared to £0.6 million. The company’s basic and diluted earnings per share was 2.91p, compared to 1.91p.

Amerisur Resources Plc (AMER.L) Announced the acquisition of Platino Energy (Barbados) Ltd (“Platino”), a private company, from COG Energy (“COG”) for a total consideration of US$7 million. The consideration will be paid in Amerisur stock and the Company will issue 22,711,494 Ordinary Shares. The payment is based on the 30 day VWAP prior to closing. A further payment will be made in Amerisur shares, approximately one month after closing following finalisation of the closing balance sheet, for the net non-cash current assets. This payment is estimated to be approximately US$0.50 million. In addition Amerisur will replace US$1.7 million of cash guarantees with the Agencia Nacional de Hidrocarburos (“ANH”), relating to the Platino assets and will also pay a 2% net royalty per block to COG, once net production in each block exceeds 5,000 barrels of oil per day. The transaction adds 190 MMBO of unrisked resources to Amerisur’s asset base.

Ashley House Plc (ASH.L) Announced, in its half year results for six months ended 31 October 2015, that revenues climbed to £10.6 million from £5.6 million posted in the same period preceding year. The company’s profit before tax stood at £0.238 million, compared to a loss of £1.9 million reported in the previous year. The basic earnings per share stood at 0.41p compared to loss of 2.77p reported in the previous year. The company’s cash and cash equivalents stood at £0.514 million (2014: £0.718 million). The company separately announced that it has applied for admission of its issued share capital to trading on the SSX segment of the ISDX Growth Market for which it expects the admission to take place around 10 February 2016.

Biome Technologies Plc (BIOM.L) Announced, in its pre-closing trading update, that the group revenues for the year rose by 37% to £4.9 million from £3.6 million reported in 2014. Revenues in the Bioplastics division increased by 29% to £1.9 million. The RF division full year revenues grew to £3.0 million from £2.1 million in 2014. The group’s cash position at 31 December 2015 was seen at £1.6 million (30 September 2015: £1.7 million). The board expects the financial performance for the full year of 2015 to be above the market’s current expectations.

BlueRock Diamonds Plc (BRD.L) Announced that it has approved the purchase of Diamond Resources pty Limited from Tawana Resources NL. The company has also purchased an intercompany loan of ZAR21.5 million owed by Diamond Resources to Tawana which is expected to be eliminated on consolidation in the company’s accounts. The total consideration for the shares in Diamond Resources and loan is ZAR0.7 million.

Brooks Macdonald Group Plc (BRK.L) Announced, in its trading update for the half year ended 31 December 2015 and an update on its funds under management, that discretionary funds for the half year rose by 5.52%. This rise is reflected across all three businesses, Asset Management, Funds and International against the WMA balanced index which declined 0.75% over the six months. As at 31 December 2015, discretionary funds under management totalled GBP £7.82 billion, an increase of 6.71%. As a comparison the WMA balanced index rose by 3.22% over the quarter. The Group’s property management business Braemar Estates had property assets under administration of £1.13 billion, an increase of 1.29%. The Group now has third party assets under administration in excess of £270.00 million. The Group intends to issue its half year results on Thursday 17 March 2016.

Card Factory Plc (CARD.L) Announced, in its trading update for the 11 months ended 31 December 2015, that the Group delivered a good level of growth in the period driven by a combination of like-for-like sales growth, new store roll out and further growth in complementary online activities. Like-for-like sales growth benefited from particularly strong growth in non-card products, which continued through the Christmas trading period. 50 net new stores were opened in the period, bringing the total estate to 814 stores as at 31 December 2015. The principal online business, Getting Personal, has continued to deliver the targeted double digit revenue growth in the second half. The trial of the relaunched Card Factory transactional website is also progressing well.

Colefax Group Plc (CFX.L) Announced, in its unaudited interim results for the six months ended 31 October 2015, that its reported revenue stood at £37.98 million, compared to £37.44 million in the preceding period. Profit after tax was £2.33 million compared to £2.01 million. The company’s diluted earnings per share was 21.6p, compared to 18.1p.

Crest Nicholson Holdings Plc (CRST.L) Announced, in its final results for the year ended 31 October 2015, that revenue stood at £804.8 million, compared to £636.3 million in the same period last year. Operating profit stood at £163.3 million, compared to £128.1 million. Profit after tax was £124.1 million, compared to £98.8 million. Diluted earnings per share stood at 48.4p, compared to 38.7p. The board proposes to pay a final dividend of 13.3p per share (2014: 10.2p per share).

Cyan Holdings Plc (CYAN.L) Announced, in its trading update for the 12 months ended 31 December 2015 as well as the outlook for 2016, that the company built on the momentum achieved during 2014 strengthening relationships with existing partners via repeat orders and establishing new commercial partners across its target markets. In India, the company continued to make strong inroads into the smart metering market and received two contracts worth in aggregate approximately £1.5 million from Enzen Global Solutions Pvt Ltd. In the rest of the world, company announced that it had received a Letter of Intent from El Sewedy Electrometer Group EMG to supply company’s CyLec Advanced Metering Infrastructure solution for a smart meter contract, which El Sewedy has been awarded in Ghana, Western Africa. Moreover, in its outlook, the company enters 2016 with significant contracted revenue backlog when compared with previous periods. The majority of both the £1 million CESC and the £0.5 million PVVNL contracts will be booked as revenue in 2016, with a significant element in H1 2016.

Diamondcorp Plc (DCP.L) Announced, in its update on the underground development at the Lace diamond mine in the Free State province of South Africa, that the production ramp up from the Upper K4 (UK4) Block continues to be on schedule to achieve full production of 30,000 tonnes per month by July. The diamonds recovered from initial processing have been meeting the expectations in terms of colour and quality, including three stones larger than 10 carats, the largest of which was a 22.11 carat H coloured stone. This diamond was sold into the company’s South African beneficiation joint venture for $5000 per carat with a view to recovering an 8 carat emerald cut stone after cutting and polishing. During the period, all the drilling, bulk testing and microdiamond sampling requested by the company’s independent consultants MPH Consulting Limited for finalisation of an update to the company’s resource statement was completed.

Dixons Carphone Plc (DC..L) Announced, in its trading update for the 10 weeks ended 09 January 2016, that the Group’s like-for-like revenues up 5% with record Black Friday and market share gains in all markets. Group Headline PBT range of £440 million to £450 million expected for the full year, slightly ahead of consensus. Sprint store trial in the US successful, agreement to activate full joint venture to manage a targeted 500 stores. There would be extension of existing honeyBee agreement with major US client to include two US carriers and New distribution agreement with TalkTalk in the UK. Additionally, significant UK property plan to be implemented in FY 2016/17. c.£20 million incremental annual earnings from FY 2017/18 and no impact on colleague numbers.

Drax Group Plc (DRX.L) Announced that it had opened a formal (Phase 2) State aid investigation into the award of an Investment Contract to Drax for its third coal-to-biomass unit conversion. This was as expected. The EC has now published further details, including confirmation that the contract was notified with a strike price of £100/MWh, in line with current market expectations. The company welcomes the opportunity to work with the UK Government and the EC to complete the State aid clearance process.

easyJet Plc (EZJ.L) Announced, in its trading statement for the quarter ended 31 December 2015, that passengers carried increased by 8.1% to 16.1 million, as capacity grew by 7.3% to 17.8 million seats and the load factor increased by 0.6 percentage points to 90.3%. Strong revenue per seat performance in October was offset by the impact of the tragic events in Egypt and Paris, resulting in lower demand and yield in November and December. Forward bookings for the second quarter are showing a marked improvement in revenue per seat compared to November and December. For the first quarter as a whole revenue per seat was down by 3.7% at constant currency. Total revenue was robust at £930 million, 0.1% down on the prior year as revenue generated by increased passenger volumes and a higher load factor was offset by reduced revenue per seat and negative foreign exchange movements of £32 million. Cost per seat decreased by 3.7% at constant currency, as a result of robust management action and acceleration of the delivery of our cost improvement plans, as well as the benefit of a low fuel price. Cost per seat excluding fuel at constant currency increased by 1.3%, which is better than previously communicated in November 2015. The company secured credit ratings at the beginning of January from Moodys (Baa1 Stable) and Standard & Poors (BBB+ Stable) and announced a £3 billion Euro Medium Term Note Programme which reflects its leading positioning at many of Europe’s top airports, strong cost position and strong balance sheet. Cash and money market deposits were £743 million and net cash was £266 million as at 31 December 2015 demonstrating the company’s continued strong balance sheet. As a result of the robust cost performance, low fuel price, disciplined capacity allocation and resilient trading, the Board’s expectations for profit before tax for the year to 30 September 2016 remains in line with market expectations.

Electra Private Equity Plc (ELTA.L) Announced that all 12 resolutions proposed at the Company’s Annual General Meeting held on 25 January 2016 were duly passed on a poll including the special resolution set out in the notice of meeting authorising the Company to make market purchases of its ordinary shares.

Elektron Technology Plc (EKT.L) Announced that on 10 September 2015 Andy Weatherstone, Chief Financial Officer, had informed the company that he wished to step down from the board with the aim of resuming his turnaround consultancy, the board is now pleased to announce that Andy has agreed to stay in his current role. Following detailed discussions it has been possible to accommodate Andy’s desire to work on other projects whilst devoting the vast majority of his time to the company as CFO.

Gama Aviation Plc (GMAA.L) Announced in its trading update for the Full year 2015 that the trading performance for the twelve months ended 31 December 2015, is in line with management expectations. The Board expects to publish its full year results by the middle of April 2016.

Greencore Group Plc (GNC.L) Announced, in its trading update covering the 13 weeks to 25 December 2015 (Quarter 1 or Q1), that the group recorded revenue of £356.0 million in the 13 weeks to 25 December 2015, an increase of 7.2% on the prior year on a reported basis and of 6.8% in constant currency. The Convenience Foods division recorded revenue of £345.1 million, 7.7% higher than the prior year on a reported basis and up 7.0% in constant currency. The Ingredients and Property division, which now represents less than 5% of group activity, recorded revenues of £10.9 million in Q1, £0.7 million or 6.0% lower on a reported basis and 3.4% higher on a constant currency basis. The business has had a good start to the year and our major investments in capacity and capability enhancement are proceeding to plan. The company remains confident in its ability to deliver performance in line with market expectations. A conference call for investors and analysts will be held at 8.30am GMT today.

Ideagen Plc (IDEA.L) Announced, in its half year results for six months ended 31 October 2015, that revenues jumped to £9.8 million from £5.7 million posted in the same period preceding year. The company’s loss before tax stood at £0.115 million, compared to a profit of £0.453 million reported in the previous year. The basic earnings per share stood at 0.0p compared to earnings of 0.31p reported in the previous year. The company further stated that the board has proposed an interim dividend of 0.061p per share, payable on 10 March 2016 to shareholders on the register on 19 February 2016.

Imperial Innovations Group Plc (IVO.L) Announced that portfolio company Inivata Limited has completed a £31.5 million Series A fundraising. The company has committed £10.0 million to the round alongside existing investors Cambridge Innovation Capital, and Johnson and Johnson Innovation who also participated in the round, as did new investor Woodford Patient Capital Trust.

Intermediate Capital (ICP.L) Announced, in its trading statement for period to 25 January 2016 that, new third party money raised in the quarter to 31 December 2015 totalled €1.4 billion, resulting in AUM increasing by 5% to €21.2 billion in the quarter to 31 December 2015; third party fee earning AUM increased 6% to €15.4 billion. Also, the ICG North America Private Debt Fund and Senior Debt Partners II strategy closed above target. The domestic Japanese Mezzanine Fund had a final close in line with expectations. The total amount of capital deployed on behalf of the direct investment funds was £456 million in the quarter and £1,898 million in the year to date (nine months to 31 December 2014: £2,104 million). The balance sheet is well funded with available cash and unutilised bank lines of £705 million at 31 December 2015. The company will be holding a Capital Markets Seminar on 3 February from 12:30.

Marston’s Plc (MARS.L) Announced, in its trading update for the 16 week period to 23 January 2016 in advance of the company’s Annual General Meeting to be held at noon today, that performance in the financial year to date has been encouraging, including good trading over the Christmas and New Year period. In Destination and Premium, like-for-like sales were 3% ahead of last year including like-for-like food sales growth of 2.5% and wet like-for-like sales growth of 3.4%. In the key two week Christmas trading period to 2 January trading was good with like-for-like growth of 4.9% despite tough comparatives. Operating margins are ahead of last year. Plans are on track to open at least 20 new pub-restaurants and five lodges in the current financial year, with seven pub and three lodge openings expected in the first half. In Taverns, managed and franchise pub like-for-like sales were 2.7% ahead of last year, with 5% growth over the Christmas fortnight. In Leased, profits are estimated to be around 3% ahead of last year. In Brewing, strong brand portfolio has performed well with own-brewed volume up 21% in the year to date, underpinned by a very strong performance in the off-trade. The company will announce Interim Results for the 26 weeks to 2 April 2016 on 18 May 2016.

Mi-Pay Group Plc (MPAY.L) Announced, in its trading update for the year ended 31 December 2015, that the trading was in line with the market expectations. It expects total revenue for the year to be £3 million, as the transaction volumes, from new and old clients’ both, grew by 48%. The company’s cash balance at 31 December 2015 was seen at £3.5 million. The company also stated that it intends to apply FRS 101 “Reduced Disclosure Framework” to the parent company accounts for the year ended 31 December 2015 and future years, which is not expected to give rise to any material changes in disclosures.

PZ CUSSONS Plc (PZC.L) Announced, in its unaudited interim results for the six months ended 30 November 2015, that its total revenue stood at £385.9 million, compared to £386.7 million in the preceding period. Profit after tax was £29.8 million compared to £29.6 million. The company’s adjusted diluted earnings per share was 7.28p, compared to 7.23p.

Qatar Investment Fund Plc (QIF.L) Announced, in its 3 months ending 31 December 2015, that the company’s net asset value per share net of dividends fell 14.6% in 2015 while Qatar Exchange Index (QE) fell 15.1% and company’s NAV per share before dividends fell 7.7%. Moreover, Qatar’s economy continues to grow, with real GDP up 3.8% in Q3 2015, driven by 7.8% growth in the non-hydrocarbon sector. GDP is expected to grow 4.7% in 2015 and 6.4% in 2016 and similar in 2017 and its 2016 budget focuses on long term infrastructure development with the government committed to spending despite low oil price. Further, Qatar’s economy expected to perform better than other GCC countries, as macroeconomic fundamentals remain strong

Restaurant Group Plc (RTN.L) Announced that Debbie Hewitt has been appointed as a Non-Executive Chairman of the company, with effect after the company’s AGM on 12 May 2016. She will succeed Alan Jackson who is retiring.

Restore Plc (RST.L) Announced, in its trading update for the year ended 31 December 2015, that trading was in line with expectations. Its Document Management division, whose core records management business accounts for the majority of Group profit, continued to perform steadily. During the year, the integration of the Cintas business, acquired in October 2014, was completed, with occupancy rates at the combined records management business increasing to more than 90%, as targeted. Wincanton Records Management, the most recent acquisition, was completed in December 2015 and the process of integration has now begun. Following a change of operational management, Restore Scan, largely comprising the former Cintas scanning business, is recovering from disappointing trading earlier in the year and has a strong order book. Restore Shred continues to show organic growth. The Group’s Full Year results will be released on 10 March 2016.

Savills Plc (SVS.L) Announced that Nick Ferguson has been appointed as a non-executive director of the company with effect from 26 January 2016 and will succeed Peter Smith as Chairman of the company following his retirement from the Board at the conclusion of the AGM in May 2016.

Sphere Medical Holding Plc (SPHR.L) Announced the first sale of its Proxima system in Germany, to the University Medical Centre Göttingen. Following Proxima’s launch in Europe in 2015, the company’s sales teams are also supporting further hospital evaluations at a number of sites.

Tern Plc (TERN.L) Announced, in its final results for the year ended 31 December 2015, that its reported turnover stood at £0.2 million, compared to £0.04 million in the preceding year. Loss net of tax was £0.9 million compared to £0.05 million. The company’s fully diluted loss per share was 0.37p, compared to 0.33p.

Union Jack Oil Plc (UJO.L) Announced that it has entered into an agreement with Egdon Resources Plc, to farm-in to the conventional prospects only of PEDL209 containing the Laughton Prospect. Under the terms of the Agreement, the company will pay 16.67% of the cost of the Laughton-1 well, scheduled to be drilled during February 2016, to earn a 10% economic interest the conventional resources in PEDL209.

Unite Group Plc (UTG.L) Announced that it acquired a development site, subject to planning, in the centre of Coventry. It is envisaged that the site will provide a home for approximately 370 students and is scheduled to be open in time for the 2017/18 academic year. The scheme is expected to achieve returns in line with Unite’s targets for regional development and the total development cost, including the cost of the land, is expected to be approximately £24 million. The delivery of the scheme will continue to drive the Group’s earnings visibility and NAV growth.