Countrywide shares plumbed fresh record lows this morning after the UK estate agent issued its second profits warning in barely six weeks and investors had to wave goodbye to the dividend. Not that the City had been pencilling in much in the way of income. Not after an already tough 2017, made tougher by a…
Mondi (MNDI) topped the UK Index on Friday, enticing investors with a bumper special dividend to prove management’s confidence that a troubled second half of 2017 was water under the bridge, boosting its yield to overtake recently shunned bond-proxies hurt by rising Treasuries. Today it’s the turn of Smurfit Kappa (SKG) – Europe’s largest producer…
The musical chairs continue at Paddy Power Betfair this morning, with CFO Alex Gersh set to leave his role after six years for personal reasons. The betting chain has seen a significant period of transition in the upper echelons of the business, with a long list non-executive directors as well as the head of marketing…
Macro observations Foreign exchange markets have begun the week digesting a double act of European political developments. While the German election has finally reached a conclusion – with a grand coalition formed between Chancellor Merkel’s CDU/CSU and the opposition SPD for the second consecutive term – another protracted coalition negotiation may be about to begin. With…
Just as many thought Donald Trump had softened his protectionist views, the US President surprised many this week by announcing import tariffs on both Steel and Aluminium. The move is meant to counter Chinese steel ‘dumping’, but the ramifications may also be felt by UK Miners. In particular, miners of Iron Ore – such as…
Conversely to a fortnight ago, when we were bouncing from Feb lows, a bearish 85% of UK 100 stocks look set to close the week in the red. After a flat week last week (50/50 stocks up/down) investors are fretting anew about not just volatility and interest rates, but tariffs, trade wars and political risk….