LONDON (ShareCast) - Xaar shares continued to fall following yesterday's profit warning, after UBS reduced its target price from 950p to 550p and Investec reduced target price from 960p to 560p, downgrading from 'buy' to 'hold'.

N Brown fell after the home-shopping business reported sales below market hopes, prompting Oriel Securities to review its 'buy' recommendation. N Brown, which caters for people aged 30 and above with brands such as Simply Be and Jacamo, said total group revenues for the 15 weeks to June 14th rose 2.6%, including like-for-like (LFL) growth of 2.5%, in line with company expectations. However, Oriel said the like-for-like figure missed market expectations and was unimpressive.

Fears that the housing boom will lose momentum hit the shares of Berkeley Holdings, exacerbated by hints from the Bank of England's of a shift in policy and looming increase in interest rates. That was despite the housebuilder reporting a 20% jump in the average sale price of its houses, which drove an 18% increase in revenues to £1.62bn and a 40.4% increase in pre-tax profits to £380m.

Apparent progress in negotiations between South African mining unions and a group of platinum producers that includes Lonmin has been set back by new union demands, pushing the stock into the red. An 'in principle' agreement reached between the platinum producers and Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU) president Joseph Mathunjwa was mandated by the union's members, but in a letter to the trio the union made some new demands which would add "huge additional costs", they said.

3i Group, 3i Infrastructure and Restaurant Group were all lower after going ex-dividend.

Meanwhile, after initially declining, Croda International was higher following the announcement of the planned departure of its Group Finance Director in April next year.


FTSE 250 - Risers
Keller Group (KLR) 961.00p +4.34%
NMC Health (NMC) 463.60p +4.04%
Barr (A.G.) (BAG) 634.50p +4.02%
Fisher (James) & Sons (FSJ) 1,328.00p +3.75%
Rank Group (RNK) 165.00p +3.71%
Foxtons Group (FOXT) 288.10p +3.63%
KCOM Group (KCOM) 94.30p +3.06%
PayPoint (PAY) 1,118.00p +2.95%
RPS Group (RPS) 272.80p +2.94%
Diploma (DPLM) 629.50p +2.78%

FTSE 250 - Fallers
Xaar (XAR) 506.50p -5.68%
African Barrick Gold (ABG) 214.10p -4.21%
3i Group (III) 397.00p -3.57%
Brown (N.) Group (BWNG) 420.40p -3.40%
Thomas Cook Group (TCG) 133.70p -3.05%
Restaurant Group (RTN) 559.50p -2.44%
3i Infrastructure (3IN) 135.50p -2.10%
Paragon Group Of Companies (PAG) 352.10p -1.95%
Redrow (RDW) 250.20p -1.88%
Homeserve (HSV) 315.00p -1.75%

NR

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