Brokers were generally positive on the shares of ARM Holdings, down 0.4%, with price targets ranging from 980p to 1350p. BNP Paribas cut its rating on Johnson Matthey, down 4%, to “Neutral” from “Outperform”. Greene King, down 3.7%, has indicated that it intends to create an additional 2,000 apprenticeships in 2015. Deutsche Bank lowered its rating on CSR, down 0.2%, to “Hold”.
Bango rose 35.9%, despite announcing that its full year turnover declined to £5.1m, from £8.8m posted last year, while its loss before tax widened to £5.4m from £4.9m. The company projects that for 2015, end user expenditure from activations will grow by at least 100% to £65 million by the end of December.
Domino Printing Sciences rose 28.9%, after Japanese firm, Brother Industries Ltd., announced that it will acquire the company for a cash consideration of about £1.03bn.
In its final results for the year ended 31 December 2014, Cambridge Cognition Holdings, up 13.9%, indicated that its revenue rose to £5.8m from £4.2m in the preceding year and operating loss narrowed to £0.3m from £3m. The company’s diluted loss per share narrowed to 1.1p from 21.3p reported in 2013.
Abcam, up 3.4%, announced that its revenues for the six months ended 31 December 2014, climbed to £66.7m from £62m recorded in the same period last year while profit after tax increased to £17.7m from £16.5m. The board proposed an interim dividend of 2.29p per share. Numis Securities maintained its “Buy” rating on the stock with a target price of 580p. However FinnCap reiterated its “Hold” rating on the company’s shares with a target price of 400p.
Panmure Gordon reiterated its “Buy” rating on Brady, up 3.2%, with a target price of 100p.
Berenberg Bank reiterated its “Buy” rating on Aveva Group, down 2.1%, with a target price of 1977p. Horizon Discovery Group, down 3.1%, announced that it will be providing genomic Reference Materials to support Phase Two of Cancer Research UK’s Stratified Medicine Programme. However, financial details of the deal were not divulged. Panmure Gordon reiterated its “Buy” rating on the stock with a target price of 247p.
Liberum Capital downgraded its rating on Kier Group, down 4.9%, to “Hold” from “Buy” with a target price of 1710p.
UK markets ended mixed last week as positive sentiment across Europe following the commencement of ECB’s bond buying programme was offset by weakness in energy stocks. The FTSE 100 index retreated 2.5% to 6,740.6, while the FTSE AIM 100 Index rose 0.6% to 3,201.1. The FTSE techMARK 100 Index gained 0.9% to 3,851.7.
US markets closed on a weaker footing in the previous week, amid continuing fears that the Fed’s interest rate hike is imminent. The DJIA index slipped 0.6% to settle at 17,749.3, while the NASDAQ Index declined 1.1% to 4,871.8.
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