FTSE in-depth: Greene King the toast of analysts
A jolly analyst trip to Yorkshire seems to have paid off for Greene King.
Merry trip: Greene King showed a band of analysts round four of its Yorkshire pubs
A clutch of bullish notes on the pubs operator and brewer of Old Speckled Hen were sent out in the wake of the excursion.
Greene King took its merry band of analysts around four pubs including one from the Cloverleaf chain which it gobbled up in January.
It also showcased a new franchise offer for its leased and tenanted pubs division which it has been keeping under wraps until now.
Analysts raised a glass to the Cloverleaf model which makes half of its weekday food sales from carvery meals.
Nigel Parson at Evolution Securities said: 'We were impressed with the scale of operation and opportunity of Cloverleaf units.'
Another analyst revealed the chain surprisingly generates a significant slice of sales from takeaway cakes. One outlet is apparently turning over £4000 to £5000 weekly in 'cakeaway' sales.
Espirito Santo Investment Bank and Deutsche Bank stuck to their buy advice for Greene King shares while Numis kept its add recommendation and 550p target price. Greene King shares bucked the gloomy mood in the market, rising 3.8p to 502.5p.
A rout in commodity prices put the skids under shares across the mining sector, with Fresnillo, the world's biggest silver miner, leading the sell-off , down 107p to 1304p.
The price of silver slid to $32.56 an ounce, having hit a high of nearly $50 just a few weeks ago.
Gold has also begun to lose its sheen while copper hit a five-month low. Investors feared China's appetite for commodities could be dented by its central bank's attempts to put the brakes on inflation. The dollar's strength was also weighing.
Other mining stocks under the cosh included Chilean copper miner Antofagasta, which shed 47p to 1142p, Vedanta Resources, down 70p at 2095p and Anglo American, off 54.5p at 2936.5p.
Not surprisingly the boss of soon-to-be-floated Glencore was keen to brush aside the fall in commodity prices, blaming it on 'froth' in the market.
Ivan Glasenberg insisted it had not affected demand for the commodities trader's forthcoming $11bn flotation.
The FTSE 100 ended the day down 31.04 points at 5944.96, having recovered from an intra-session low of 5882.39 as commodity prices gained some poise late in the afternoon.
Over on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average had pared back its early losses by the closing bell to trade up 65.89 points at 12695.90.
On the upside, Scottish & Southern Energy rose 17p to 1368p lifted by a report that Spain's Iberdrola was mulling a takeover bid for the UK company or a merger with Germany's RWE.
British Energy owner Centrica, the focus of bid speculation on Wednesday, put on another 6.5p to 318.2p.
Shares in drugs firm AstraZeneca were injected 44p higher to 3186.5p after UBS turned buyer of the stock ahead of a US regulatory decision on its potential blood thinning medicine Bilinat.
But interdealer broker Icap was depressed by news that rival Tullett Prebon (down 24.5p at 393p) suffered a fall in revenues in the first four months of the year. Icap shares fell 10.8p to 498.7p.
On the second line, a profits warning wiped a fifth off the market value of construction firm Keller Group, which built the foundations for London's 2012 Olympic Stadium. S
hares tumbled 132p to 529p after it said profits would fall 10% this year, hit by stiff competition in the US, floods in Australia and political unrest in the Middle East.
Hiscox shares shed 0.1p to 417p. Its chairman Robert Hiscox has cut his stake in the company by £6.7m.
A statement said the change in ownership was 'by virtue of a connected person reaching the age of maturity'. Hiscox has five children. He still owns 4.9m shares, worth £20m.
DTZ Holdings shot up 12p to 51p, building on Wednesday's gains, after French property firm Saint George Participations, which already owns 55% of the property consultant, confirmed it was its hopeful suitor.
An upbeat trading statement lifted photobooth maker Photo-Me International 5.75p to 48p while Fortune Oil put on 0.75p to 14.125p after announcing a Chinese joint venture.
Aim-listed biotech Summit Corp put on 1.16p to 5.16p on news it will receive a £925,000 payment from the Wellcome Trust to move its drug candidate for treating hospital superbug Clostridium Difficile towards clinical trials.
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