Moneysupermarket buying cashback website Quidco, Bellway hikes final dividend

Stocks to watch

Online price comparison platform Moneysupermarket said it was buying consumer cashback website Quidco for up to £101m. Moneysupermarket on Tuesday said it would pay £87m in cash with a further £14m deferred on a debt-free, cash-free basis. Quidco is the second largest cash back business in the UK with around one million transacting users. It offers cashback at around 4,500 merchants including retail, travel and switching services, Moneysupermarket added.

Bellway increased its final dividend by almost two-thirds as the housebuilder reported a 72% increase in annual profit and a solid order book. Underlying pre tax profit rose to £530.8m in the 12 months to the end of July from £309.3m a year earlier as revenue increased 40% to £3.12bn. Statutory pre tax profit more than doubled to £479m from £236.7m. The FTSE 250 group increased its final dividend by 65% to 82.5p a share taking the annual payout to 117.5p - up 135%. Bellway said its forward order book was £1.97bn on 3 October, up from £1.87bn a year earlier.

RHI Magnesita said demand was still strong for both its steel and industrial businesses in the September quarter, with its raw material assets and refractory plants operating at high capacity utilisation, and order book visibility extending into the first quarter of 2022. The FTSE 250 company said net debt-to-EBITDA was set to remain at a “temporarily higher level” of around 2x at year-end, however, due to lower profitability in the third quarter and increased inventory levels to mitigate supply chain disruption. At the same time, it said it had agreed to acquire an 85.22% stake in Turkish refractory producer SORMAS for consideration of €38.8m (£32.82m) in cash.

Newspaper round-up

Ministers have unveiled plans for £5,000 grants to allow people to install home heat pumps and other low-carbon boiler replacements as part of a wider heat and buildings strategy that some campaigners warned lacked sufficient ambition and funding. Labour also condemned the plans as “more of Boris Johnson’s hot air”, without sufficient substance.- Guardian

British households will be £1,000 worse off next year from a cost of living squeeze created by rising energy prices and shortages of workers and supplies caused by Covid and Brexit, a leading think tank has warned. The Resolution Foundation said higher levels of inflation would weigh down workers’ earnings next year, contributing to a hit to the average household income in Britain at a time when the government is cutting benefits and raising taxes. - Guardian

Kwasi Kwarteng has intervened in a planned £6.3bn US takeover of Meggitt amid concerns it could harm national security. The Government issued a public interest intervention notice into Parker Hannifin's deal on Monday night in a move it said came after ministers received official advice. - Telegraph

Big Tech companies have been accused of failing to stop an “epidemic of scams” that has caused some victims to consider taking their own lives. Martin Lewis, the founder of consumer advice website MoneySavingExpert, told MPs the proliferation of scam adverts on social media had resulted in some people being defrauded of tens of thousands of pounds. - Telegraph

Boris Johnson has announced almost £10 billion of overseas investment in Britain before a global summit in an attempt to trump Emmanuel Macron’s efforts to lure businesses to France. The prime minister said that the 18 new trade and investment pledges would “power our economic recovery”, creating 30,000 jobs in sectors such as wind and hydrogen energy, and environmentally friendly homes. - The Times

US close

Wall Street stocks turned in a mixed performance on Monday as bond yields headed north and Chinese GDP numbers disappointed.

At the close, the Dow Industrial Average was down 0.10% at 35,258.61, while the S&P 500 was 0.34% stronger at 4,486.46 and the Nasdaq Composite saw out the session 0.84% firmer at 15,021.81.

The Dow closed 36.15 points weaker on Monday, cutting into gains recorded at the tail end of last week on the back of a better than anticipated start to the third-quarter earnings season.

In focus on Monday, the yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note ticked up to above 1.58% at the start of the week, applying some pressure to shares, while also weighing on sentiment was a report from Beijing that gross domestic product had fallen short of estimates in the third quarter, coming in at 4.9% annual growth, less than the 5.3% clip expected by economists.

On the macro front, US industrial production dropped unexpectedly last month, according to the Department of Commerce, which revealed that, in seasonally adjusted terms, total output shrank at a month-on-month pace of 1.3%, compared to a 0.3% rise as forecast by economists. Manufacturing production dropped by 0.7% in comparison to the prior month, while mining output declined 2.3% and utilities fell 3.6%.