LONDON (ShareCast) - Charles Stanley has initiated its coverage on newly-listed building materials group CRH with a hold recommendation after it joined the FTSE 100 earlier this month.

“On valuation the shares are probably cheap on a long term view and should have yield support but, given the economic outlook and the cyclicality of the industry there seems no urgency to buy the shares,” said analyst Tome Gidley-Kitchin.

Panmure Gordon has reiterated its buy recommendation on luxury fashion brand Mulberry, saying that today’s appointment of new Chief Executive Bruno Guillon, currently the Managing Director of Hermes France, “makes perfect sense to us”.

“It is logical for Mulberry to seek to add to its top management team someone with the right global brand management skills. This should enable it to move on to the next stage of its development, which is to become a truly global brand with sales of over £1bn, rather than barely more than £100m,” said analyst Philip Dorgan.

A 2,000p target price is kept.

Shares in high street chocolate chain Thorntons plummeted on Wednesday following the group's full-year profit warning. Things were not helped by a number of downbeat broker comments early on.

"In the absence of more quantified details on trading across the channels and margin performance in the peak Q2 period, we are therefore placing our PBT and dividend forecasts under review," said Investec analysts David Jeary and Bethany Hocking. The broker leaves its hold rating unchanged.

Merchant Securities also believes that Thorntons' dividend is now at risk, saying that it expects the firm to reduce or even eliminate the payout. Merchant has maintained its sell rating on the stock.

BC

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