FTSE 250 movers: Close Bros surges on upgrade; IG slips after sale

Close Brothers surged after an upgrade to ‘outperform’ at RBC Capital Markets.

The bank argued that whether you are looking at historical or sector-relative valuation, Close Brothers shares screen as cheap.

It noted that the shares have underperformed the sector by around 55% year-to-date.

RBC said the bad news around the Financial Conduct Authority’s review of motor finance is now well embedded into consensus and net interest margin and loan growth assumptions are sensible.

"Therefore, we currently see asymmetric risk to the upside, as the market continues to myopically focus on capital, while we see a number of potential catalysts including: i) a softening of Basel 3.1; ii) a Novitas settlement; iii) IRB approval," it said.

"Structurally, it is helpful that CBG's NIM is relatively agnostic to a falling rate environment."

IG Group lost ground after Tom Sosnoff and Scott Sheridan sold 6.5m shares in the company in a placing to a limited number of institutional investors. The placing represents around 1.8% of the existing share capital in the company.

Sosnoff and Sheridan were co-founders of US online brokerage and trading education platform Tastytrade, which was acquired by IG in 2021 for $1bn.

Dr Martens, Diversified Energy, Zigup, Clarkson, PageGroup, Savills, Serco, and Quilter all fell as they went ex-dividend.

Market Movers

FTSE 250 - Risers

Close Brothers Group (CBG) 521.00p 6.85%
Auction Technology Group (ATG) 426.00p 3.52%
4Imprint Group (FOUR) 5,290.00p 2.52%
Harbour Energy (HBR) 307.10p 2.37%
Wizz Air Holdings (WIZZ) 1,344.00p 2.05%
WH Smith (SMWH) 1,281.00p 1.83%
Volution Group (FAN) 554.00p 1.65%
Carnival (CCL) 1,149.50p 1.59%
Spirent Communications (SPT) 178.70p 1.48%
TBC Bank Group (TBCG) 3,140.00p 1.45%

FTSE 250 - Fallers

Zigup (ZIG) 402.00p -3.83%
Hochschild Mining (HOC) 171.00p -3.82%
Plus500 Ltd (DI) (PLUS) 2,584.00p -2.86%
IG Group Holdings (IGG) 968.50p -2.37%
Helios Towers (HTWS) 113.20p -2.25%
RHI Magnesita N.V. (DI) (RHIM) 3,235.00p -1.97%
Balanced Commercial Property Trust Limited (BCPT) 85.90p -1.83%
AO World (AO.) 111.60p -1.76%
Pagegroup (PAGE) 397.20p -1.68%
Genus (GNS) 1,766.00p -1.67%