Yesterday's trading: Virgin eyeing Pipex
Ubiquitous Sir Richard Branson is to take time out from his mucky carriage dispute with James Murdoch's BSkyB to go on the acquisition trail.
Red hot rumours that his Virgin Media, the former NTL cable group, is on the verge of forking out around £478m or 20p a share in cash for Pipex Communications left the fixed-line telecommunications group 2p better at 17p on turnover of 255m.
Pipex is the sixth largest broadband company in the UK and recently appointed UBS, which holds 18.2% of its equity, to find a buyer. BT, Carphone Warehouse, Orange, Tiscali and BSkyB have all shown an interest but industry sources suggest that late-comer Virgin Media is now odds on favourite to tie up an agreed deal within the next couple of days.
Pipex focuses on the UK consumer broadband market. It is willing to heavily discount its broadband charges for those consumers willing to commit to taking bundled services on 12 or 18 month contracts. But it is the domain name registration business is something rivals would also love to get their hands on.
Shares of Imperial Energy were changing hands at £6 at the beginning of the year, now look at them. Yesterday, they closed 86p higher at 1346p. Earlier this month an independent audit by DeGolyer and MacNaughton lit the touch paper when it said the group's proven and probable reserves in western Siberia were around 803m barrels of oil - a 150% increase on previous estimates.That sparked a significant re-rating.
Buyers filled their boots again yesterday following news of its plans to apply for a full listing on the London Stock Exchange at the end of next month. It has also secured a £100m bank facility with ABN Amro to fund the development of the three key fields that will contribute to its production targets of 10,000 barrels a day in 2007 and 25,000 in 2008.
Mirroring the bullish mood of international markets overnight, the Footsie jumped 61.2 points to 6,318. The Federal Reserve's decision to keep US interest rates on hold at 5¼% and say that it is no longer biased towards higher interest rates had dealers around the world heaving a sigh of relief and believing that the next move in US rates could be down.
The FTSE 250 advanced 95.4 points to 11,708.1. Wall Street lost an early 28 point gain on profit-taking and traded 3 easier in the early stages.
Barclays Bank jumped 26½p to 739p on heavy buying which swelled turnover to 127m amid growing speculation that Bank of America is about to bid for Barclays and so ruin its plans to climb into bed with ABN Amro.
BG Group gushed 23½p to 719p amid revived rumours of a bid from Royal Dutch Shell, 22p up at 1642p. A Citigroup recommendation attracted buyers to Wickes DIY group Travis Perkins, 89p better at 2059p.
Struggling Spirent Communications eased ¾p to 62p after a 15% stake in the group was placed with various institutional investors at 61p a share.
Cash-rich investment bank Evolution rose 3p to 148p on hearing that RIT Capital Partners (1½p easier at 1003p) owns 9m shares, or 4.1%. South African investment bank Investec advanced 19p to 669p on a bullish trading update.
It has taken over the sponsorship of the MCC Media Centre at Lords Cricket ground from NatWest adding to their existing sponsorship deals with the RFU and the Super 14 Rugby in Australia.
Cape shrugged off a £68m fund-raising to finish 5½p dearer at 274p. Some 26.9m shares were placed at 260p a share with various institutional investors. Cash raised will help fund acquisitions. The group is currently in talks to acquire%H of Australia for around £60m.
Keith Birch's Touchstone jumped 7p to 190p as dealers gave the thumbs up to its £2.977m acquisition of ETC Global Solutions, a Microsoft business solutions consultancy.
Spanish estate agent Medsea Estates rose 3p to 16½p in response to record annual profits of £2.9m compared with a loss of £52,000 last time. Turnover rose by 55% to £13.3m.
Specialist coatings company E Wood soared 82½p to 317½p following an agreed 323p a share cash offer from 3M UK Holdings.
Akers Biosciences rose 3½p to 34p after receiving its first substantial purchase orders for products in the UK, through its UK distributor Advanced Rapid Diagnostics.
ARD has ordered more than 2,000 units of a combination of the US Department of Transportation approved alcohol breathalyser kits, which are marketed under the name Breath Alcohol Check, and drug abuse test kits.
• Pure Wafer, which reclaims and restores the wafers used in electronics, shed 5p to 327½p. Altium placed Apax's 49% shareholding with various institutional investors at 300p a share. The broker is bullish and says PW is ideally placed to exploit changes to semi-conductor manufacturing. Its target price is 435p.
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