ARM Holdings, up 5.2%, announced that its first quarter revenue jumped 22% to £227.5m, while its net profit climbed to £85m from £62.3m reported in the same period earlier year. Its basic EPS rose to 6p from 4.4p. Barclays reiterated its “Overweight” rating on the stock with a target price of 1300p and JPMorgan Chase increased its target price to 950p from 900p with an unchanged “Neutral” rating.
Greene King, up 0.9%, stated that it has made an application to the UK Listing Authority to list additional 232,000 shares of 12.5p each to Official List and to the London Stock Exchange. AVEVA Group, up 7.8%, announced that results for the financial year ended 31 March 2015 are likely to be at par with market forecasts. Numis Securities reaffirmed its “Add” rating on the stock with a target price of 1770p. Credit Suisse Group AG reiterated its “Outperform” recommendation on the stock with a target price of 1800p.
Blinkx, up 9.2%, announced that it has joined its brand advertising trade entities under a single brand - RhythmOne (1R). Sphere Medical Holding increased 8.1%, after it was announced that Woodford Investment Management, through Woodford Patient Capital Trust Plc, has entered into a legally binding commitment to subscribe 23.1m placing shares at 16p per share.
In its trading update, Frontier Developments, up 5.2%, indicated that it expects sales of its recently released “Elite: Dangerous” game to be more than expected and hopes to generate revenue of around £22m by the end of current fiscal year. It stated that total unit sales surpassed 500,000. Gaming Realms, up 1.1%, indicated that its revenue rose to £11.2m, compared to £0.9m posted in 2013, however the company’s loss before tax widened to £9.8m, compared to a loss of £3.4m posted last year. The company’s basic and diluted loss per share stood at 5.9p, compared to a loss of 9.34p reported last year.
SP Angel reiterated its “Buy” recommendation on Sepura, up 0.8%, with a target price of 170p. Northland Securities increased its target price on Amino Technologies, up 0.4%, to 150p from 140p and maintained its “Buy” rating.
Kier Group, down 0.7%, announced that it has won a £170m contract from the Greenland Group. Horizon Discovery Group, down 3.2%, announced that it has agreed an OEM manufacturing contract with Transgenomic Inc. The company also announced that it has signed a supply & commercialisation agreement with Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc, in which the latter will market and supply the former’s X-MAN human haploid and diploid isogenic cell line collection. Canaccord Genuity reiterated its “Buy” rating on Dialight, down 5.1%, with a target price of 900p.
UK markets ended higher last week, after the People’s Bank of China introduced fresh stimulus measures by reducing the reserve ratio requirement for banks by 1%. The FTSE 100 index advanced 1.1% to 7,070.7, while the FTSE AIM 100 Index gained 0.7% to finish at 3,431.3. The FTSE techMARK 100 Index climbed 3.2% to 3,942.7.
US markets closed firmer previous week, buoyed by robust corporate results and a greater-than-expected rebound in US durable goods orders for March also spurred investor sentiment. The DJIA index jumped 1.4% to 18,080.1, while the NASDAQ Index rose 3.2% to 5,092.1.
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