Thursday newspaper share tips: Barclays, Henderson Group

Profits improved, but only once you exclude all the awkward bits of the business the lender wants to hive off.

Over the first three months of the year, Barclays was forced to crystallise losses of £815m at its non-core unit and there is another £51bn in other assorted junk which it is looking to get rid of, the tipster pointed out.

Furthermore, profits in its core UK retail banking division were stagnant while costs worsened from 73% of revenues to 76%, partly as a result of increased costs at its investment banking arm.

New boss Jess Staley´s strategic vision is also questionable, seeing how he is giving another roll of the dice to investment banking while selling its African unit, a deeply rooted franchise in one of the world´s most promising regions.

"On some valuation measures the shares are starting to look cheap. That doesn’t mean they can’t get cheaper," Tempus said.

Henderson Group´s five-year run of outperformance hit a speed bump over the last quarter, but the group´s will likely prove short-lived, Tempus said.

In the latest quarter, investors, mainly pension funds, took out a net £679m from the business as they switched from fixed-income mandates to other assets higher up on the risk curve.

The group, a 'bear' on commodities, energy and emerging markets, predictably fell afoul of the recent rally in those markets.

However, so long as it is just that and not a genuine shift in fundamentals then the fund manager should soon recover its vigour.

Investors should also take note of chief, Andrew Formica´s optimism regarding the pipeline of business from American retail investors and global institutions and its better-than-average fund managers.

'Buy', Tempus said.