58 2GM Saturday May 28 2022 | the timesBusinessMarkets
5Jessica Newman Market report
0.6 per cent, to 20,373.52, meaning
that it has advanced 536.57 points,
or 2.7 per cent, this week.
Scottish Mortgage Investment
Trust rose 49p, or 6.6 per cent, to
795p to sit top of the leaderboard
after Alibaba, one of its main
holdings, said profits had exceeded
expectations in the first quarter.
Harbour Energy, the biggest oil
and gas producer in the UK North
Sea, bookended the other side of
the index, falling 46p, or 10.8 per
cent, to 382p, as the lack of clarity
on whether a windfall tax will be
imposed on electricity generators
led investors to dump their shares.
The levy on oil and gas
companies soured sentiment
towards the likes of BP, which slid
4½p, or 1.1 per cent, to 430¾p.
But the government’s £15 billion
support package for households
helped boost Ocado, the online
grocer, in the hope it will encourage
consumers to loosen their purse
strings. The grocer’s shares
improved 43p, or 5 per cent, to
901½p, while shares of Gym Group
rose by 8p, or 4 per cent, to 207p.
Investors dumped Moonpig on
the back of a Bloomberg report that
said a handful of the retailer’s
shareholders had offloaded about
£80 million in shares, or nearly an
8 per cent stake in the business. The
stock slumped to the bottom of the
mid-caps, falling 16½p, or 6 per cent,
to end the day at 255¾p.
Shares in Workspace Group
ticked up 13½p, or 1.9 per cent, to
716½p after the flexible office space
provider said it was mulling the sale
of the light industrial assets it has
acquired following the takeover of
rival McKay, which owned a
£455 million portfolio of offices and
warehouses.
The £401 million pulled from
Premier Miton funds in the six
months to the end of March did notD
eliveroo’s stock market
slide continued after
JP Morgan issued a
bearish broker note.
Marcus Diebel, an
analyst at the US bank, said that
although the food delivery group
had a healthy balance sheet and a
net cash position of £1.1 billion, its
name “scans unfavourably” given its
lack of profitability.
“Provided that Deliveroo will
only likely turn profitable in 2024,
we see limited scope for
outperformance in the short term,”
Diebel said, as he cut the bank’s
“overweight” recommendation on
the shares to “neutral” and halved
its price target to 94p.
Analysts also aired their concerns
over the group’s reliance ondiscretionary spending, cutting
their order growth estimates to
reflect increasing consumer
weakness. Shares in Deliveroo,
which was floated in March last
year, lost 1¼p, or 1.4 per cent, to
close at 86p, less than a quarter of
the 390p at which they were listed
and not far above the all-time low
plumbed earlier this week.
It was more upbeat on London’s
wider markets, with the FTSE 100
closing up 20.54 points, or 0.3 per
cent, at 7,585.46 as the Federal
Reserve’s minutes hinted that it
could ease back on rapid rate rises
later in the year. Over the week, the
index gained 195.48 points, or
2.6 per cent — its best weekly
performance since mid-March. The
FTSE 250 improved 123.78 points,Food delivery group’s late arrival
at profitability concerns analysts
KPMG to add 3,500
staff to tech division
KPMG, the accountancy firm,
will employ 3,500 new data
scientists and engineers over the
next three years, more than
doubling its 3,000-strong tech
department. KPMG said 1,000 of
the jobs would be based in
London. Staff will run its
upcoming products division,
which will pioneer a data
analytics dashboard for retailers
and a workforce-planning
programme for the NHS. KPMG
also plans to offer banks, insurers
and asset managers use of a data
analytics tool to help them
understand their environmental,
social and governance (ESG)
risks. Jon Holt, KPMG’s UK chief
executive, said businesses were
seeking to be more resilient
against a “challenging economic
and geopolitical backdrop”.Lockdowns take toll
on China’s factories
Profits fell at their fastest pace in
two years at China’s industrial
firms as city lockdowns disrupted
supplies. Industrial profits fell by
8.5 per cent last month compared
with a year earlier as margins
were squeezed by the rising price
of raw materials and Covid
restrictions in Shanghai, which
caused chaos at the world’s
biggest port. Manufacturing
profits fell 22.4 per cent as firms
were not able to operate at full
capacity. Li Keqiang, China’s
premier, said that the economic
difficulties were in some ways
worse than when the first wave of
the pandemic hit in 2020. “We
should strive to lower the
unemployment rate and keep
economic operations within a
reasonable range,” he said.Rallying Pizza Express
poaches KFC boss
Paula MacKenzie, the former
boss of KFC, will be the new chief
executive at Pizza Express,
following the resignation of
David Campbell last October.
MacKenzie will start on June 6.
She joins the restaurant chain
from Yum Brands, KFC’s parent
firm, where she led the UK and
Ireland business as managing
director. She had been at the
group for 11 years, having
previously worked at Diageo,
GlaxoSmithKline and Innocent.
Pizza Express is continuing its
turnaround following a major
restructuring after the pandemic.
The chain has cut more than 70
restaurants and about 2,400 jobs
but last year secured a a
£335 million refinancing deal and
is to open new restaurants.Company Change
Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust Renewed confidence in tech stocks 6.6%
Ninety One Extends gains 5.8%
Allianz Technology Trust Tracks bounce in tech stocks 5.0%
Ocado Group Boosted by government’s support package 5.0%
Baillie Gifford US Growth Trust Rebounds after being swept up in recent tech sell-off 4.9%
ITV Positive sentiment dries up -3.9%
Drax Group Uncertainty over prospect of windfall tax -4.2%
Moonpig Group Shareholders dump £80 million shares -6.0%
Johnson Matthey Continues to fall after selling electric car battery business -6.8%
Harbour Energy Soured sentiment towards energy stocks -10.8%The day’s biggest movers
take the shine off the fund
manager’s share price. The shares
shot up 10p, or 8.9 per cent, to 123p,
as Premier — which abandoned a
possible takeover of River and
Mercantile, a rival investment
house, earlier this year — reported
a jump in pre-tax profits to
£9.9 million within the period.
Shares in Big Technologies, a
people-tracking company, jumped
24½p, or 9.3 per cent, to 289p as it
said it had made “good progress”
since its flotation on London’s
junior stock market last July. It said
that the number of people that it
tracks is growing around the world,helping revenues grow to
£13.9 million in the four months to
the end of April — an 18 per cent
increase on the same period the
year before.
Analysts at Berenberg urged
investors to start buying shares in
DWF Group, the London-listed law
firm, which has said it expects full-
year profits to be in line with City
expectations, and 20 per cent
higher than the year before. James
Bayliss, an analyst at the bank,
believes DWF is undervalued and
“largely misunderstood by the
public markets”, but suggests it is a
highly defensive investment and
believes the shares have the
potential to outperform. The shares,
however, inched ½p lower to 106p.Analysts also raised concerns over Deliveroo’s reliance on discretionary spendingTOBY MELVILLE/REUTERSWall Street report
New data showing strength in
retail spending and signs that
inflation may be peaking pushed
indices higher. The Dow Jones
industrial average rose 575.77
points, or 1.8 per cent, to 33,212.96,
for a weekly gain of 6.2 per cent.Workspace mulls sale
of light industrial sites
Workspace Group, the property
company, said that it was
considering selling parts of the
McKay Securities business it
bought this month. Shares in the
London-listed business closed up
13½p, or 1.9 per cent, at 716½p
yesterday after the company told
shareholders that it could sell
McKay’s light industrial assets
after receiving “significant
interest” from potential suitors.
Workspace paid £272 million for
McKay, which previously said
that its portfolio included nine
light industrial sites. Workspace
said it had received “unsolicited
indications of interest” from a
number of unnamed parties for
the entire portfolio and could use
the sale to generate capital.