Plus500 maintains expectations, Segro buys West London warehouse
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The FTSE 100 is expected to open 45 points lower on Monday, having closed up 2.25% at 6,484.30 on Friday.
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Contracts-for-difference platform Plus500 said full year revenue and profitability for the full year is currently expected to be in-line with consensus expectations as volatile markets in recent weeks represented a gain for its customers. The company on Monday said second quarter revenue to date stood at $102.5m with customer income at $249m.
Segro has bought a 34-acre warehouse site in West London for £202.5m from Federated Hermes. The property investor and developer said the Perivale Park estate was in its core west London cluster by the A4 into central London and within two miles of the North Circular, making it "perfectly located" for distribution into London. It has 55,100 sq m of lettable space over 23 units and eight acres of land with development potential.
Energean confirmed the restart of work on the Energean Power FPSO in Singapore’s Admiralty Yard on Monday, and also reported that the subsea installation campaign, offshore Israel, was progressing as planned. The FTSE 250 company said the ramp-up of the workforce, currently expected over the course of June, would be dictated by the Singaporean authorities given Covid-19 and its associated restrictions. In Israel, the firm said the installation of the manifold and subsea isolation valves would be completed by the end of June, with installation of the risers that would connect the three producing wells expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2021.
Newspaper round-up
Downing Street fears that Michel Barnier has lost his grip on the fishing negotiations, throwing doubt over Boris Johnson’s hopes of a summer of swift and definitive progress towards a trade and security deal with the EU. The bloc’s chief negotiator had been expected to present a compromise proposal on access to British waters during the talks last week but was blocked at the last minute by member states with large fishing communities. – Guardian
One of Britain's top bankers has urged the Treasury to rapidly take responsibility for tens of billions of pounds of toxic business loans as lenders seek to free themselves of coronavirus debt. Lloyds chairman Norman Blackwell, a former policy chief to Margaret Thatcher and John Major, called on the government to set up a vehicle that will take on debts from some companies unable to repay their state-backed coronavirus loans. – Telegraph
Royal Bank of Scotland delayed a £20m deal to import personal protective equipment by freezing the account of a pub where David Cameron and Xi Jinping, China’s president, once shared a pint. The Plough at Cadsden was forced to shut during the pandemic but its Chinese owners were using their contacts to import PPE during the crisis. The pub launched a legal action in the High Court after RBS froze its bank account in April without explanation. – Telegraph
The external auditor of BT has issued an “adverse opinion” on the company’s internal financial reporting controls in a fresh blow to its accounting credibility. KPMG wrote in a letter that BT “did not maintain effective internal control over financial reporting as of March 31, 2020 [the end of its financial year] because of . . . material weaknesses related to general IT controls and risk assessments”. – The Times
AstraZeneca has abandoned a tentative interest in combining with an American rival behind remdesivir, the coronavirus treatment. The London-listed, Cambridge-based pharmaceuticals company made a preliminary approach to Gilead Sciences last month, according to Bloomberg. – The Times
US close
Stocks on Wall Street closed well into the green on Friday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average rising 3.15% at 27,110.98.
The S&P 500 was ahead 2.62% at 3,193.93, and the Nasdaq Composite gained 2.06% to 9,814.08.