LONDON MARKET PRE-OPEN 13 July 2017

Babcock In Line; Sport Direct Buys 25% Of Game

LONDON (Alliance News) Stocks in London are called for a positive open on Thursday, following a
strong session for equity markets in the US, after comments by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen on
Wednesday that were taken as dovish.
In early UK company news, FTSE 100 engineering and service provider Babcock International Group
said trading had being in line since April 1, keeping its guidance for its full financial year unchanged.
The financial year has started well, with the group trading in line with our expectations and the
outlook for the year unchanged. Since the full-year results announcement on May 24, visibility has
continued to improve, with around 82% of revenue now in place for 2017/2018, said the company
in a statement.
Babcock said the order book and bid pipeline of opportunities have remained stable at around
GBP19.0 billion and GBP10.5 billion, respectively, following contract wins. The firm said the tracking
pipeline remains buoyant, providing confidence in our ability to grow in line with our expectations
this year and over the medium-term.
AIM-listed online fashion retailer ASOS said revenue grew 32% to GBP675.8 million in the four
months to June 30 from GBP512.4 million a year earlier. The firm left its full-year guidance
unchanged, saying that pretax profit is anticipated to be in line with market consensus.
Strong sales momentum [seen in the first half] has continued through the third period supported
by our ongoing investment in our customer proposition and in price, said Chief Executive Nick
Beighton.
We remain on track and confident of meeting market expectations and will release our results for
the year to August 31 on October 17, Beighton noted.
FTSE 250-listed Game Digital confirmed a Sky News report that Sports Direct International had
bought a 25.75% stake in the video games retailer.
The news was reported by Sky News on Wednesday, saying billionaire Mike Ashley, founder and
majority owner of Sport Direct, is thought to see opportunities in Games presence in the fast-
growing e-sports market.
Game said Sports Direct has acquired 44 million Game shares, adding that it is pleased that the
strategic value of the group has been recognised by the sporting goods retailer.
IG says futures indicate the FTSE 100 index to open 7.07 points higher at 7,424.00. The blue-chip
index closed up 1.2%, or 87.17 points, at 7,416.93 on Wednesday.
Equity markets jumped sharply yesterday with the Dow hitting a new record high, while the US
dollar slumped after Yellen caught investors by surprise by leaning back from the prospect of
multiple rate hikes in the coming months, says CMC Markets chief market analyst Michael Hewson.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended up 0.6% at 21,532.14, having hit an all-time high of
21,580.79. The S&P 500 ended up 0.7% while the Nasdaq Composite rose 1.1%.
Yellen, in prepared remarks for her closely-watched testimony before the US Congress late
Wednesday, reiterated that with further gradual adjustments in the stance of monetary policy,
the [US] economy will continue to expand at a moderate pace over the next couple of years.
The Fed Chair reiterated that the US central bank intends to gradually reduce its balance sheet,
although she said the Fed does not intend to use the balance sheet as an active tool for monetary
policy in normal times.
Her focus of appearing to lean more towards reducing the size of the Feds balance before the end
of this year was always the more likely outcome given recent comments from other senior Fed
officials, and this belief was reinforced in yesterdays comments with some speculating that we
could see action as soon as the September meeting, Hewson says.
Market reaction was also reinforced by her comments that inflation was running below target
and that rates wouldnt need to rise much further to get back to neutral. This comment in
particular suggests that the Fed believes that a lot of the heavy lifting on rates may well have been
done in the short term, which may help explain why we saw long term yields slip back down to a
one-week low, and certainly takes a September rate rise off the table, the analyst notes.
The pound was quoted at USD1.2913 early Thursday, firm against USD1.2889 at the London equities
close on Wednesday.
In Asia on Thursday, the Japanese Nikkei 225 index ended flat. In China, the Shanghai Composite is
up 0.5%, while the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong is up 0.9%.
Chinas exports increased at a faster-than-expected pace in June, the General Administration of
Customs said. In dollar terms, exports grew 11.3% year-over-year in June, faster than the 8.9% rise
economists had forecast.
Similarly, imports surged 17.2% in June from a year ago, bigger than the expected growth of 14.5%.
The trade surplus totaled USD42.8 billion in June versus the expected surplus of USD42.6 billion.
Elsewhere in the economic calendar on Thursday, US initial and continuing jobless claims are at 1330
BST, together with the producer price index. The second session of Yellens testimony before US
Congress starts at 1500 BST.
By Daniel Ruiz; danielruiz@alliancenews.com
Copyright 2017 Alliance News Limited. All Rights Reserved.
Asian Markets
Asian stock markets are in positive territory following the overnight gains on Wall Street after
Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen's testimony before Congress indicated that the central bank will
gradually tighten policy
U.S. Markets
U.S. stocks closed higher with the U.S.30 setting its first closing record in nearly a month as Federal
Reserve Chair Janet Yellen emphasized the central banks gradual approach to normalizing monetary
policy
Today's News
Babcock International Group on said its new financial year has "started well" to leave it
confident in its outlook, and said it has already locked in large portions of anticipated revenue for
this year and next. The blue-chip engineering services firm's current financial year began at the
start of April. Babcock released its annual results in May for the 12 months to the end of March,
beating expectations after reporting a 7.6% jump in adjusted pretax profit and reporting a 9.1%
lift to the annual dividend. Babcock said trading has been in line with expectations in the new
financial year and said visibility has continued to improve The company said it has 82% of
expected revenue for the current year to the end of March 2018 locked in, as well as around 55%
of anticipated revenue for the 2019 financial year.
LondonMetric Property has acquired two Marks & Spencer stores in Newport, Isle of Wight and
Kendal, Lancashire for 24.6m. The two edge of town centre properties are let to M&S at a total
rent of 1.4m a year, subject to annual rental uplifts of 2% and the existing lease runs for a
further 10 years. The company said the acquisitions, which reflect a net initial yield of 5.45%, will
complement its existing convenience portfolio which now includes eight M&S stores and four Aldi
stores and is valued at 85m.
Investors in BTG were preparing for the firms annual general meeting on Thursday morning,
with chief executive Louise Makin confirming the groups strong performance in the 2017
financial year had carried over into the start of the 2018 year. The company was on track to
achieve double digit sales growth in the 12 months to 31 March 2018, Makin said in a statement,
which was being driven by growth in its international medicine business. We reported positive
outcomes from two EKOS clinical studies in the first quarter and we anticipate further progress
across the portfolio over the full year, including reaching important milestones for Varithena and
the PneumRx coils, Makin said.
ASOS reported growth in revenue in the four months to the end of June and in the ten months to
the same date, and said it expects full-year sales growth to be at the upper end of its guided
range. ASOS said total revenue in the four months to June 30 grew to 675.8m from 512.4m
the year before, as UK retail sales rose to 234.6m from 203.1m and international retail sales
increased to 425.5m from 295.2m. In the ten months to the same date, total sales were up to
1.59bn from 1.18bn, as UK retail sales rose to 575.4m from 492.6m and international retail
sales grew to 973.9m from 650.3m. ASOS said its results were boosted by a 25% increase in
the number of active customers, a 3% rise in average basket value and 6% rise in average order
frequency. The total number of orders shipped increased by 28% to 16.9 million.
The UK economy grew at a subdued rate in the second quarter of 2017, the British Chambers of
Commerce said in its Quarterly Economic Survey, published on Thursday. In the manufacturing
sector, the balance of firms reporting increasing domestic sales held steady at +20, while
domestic orders fell slightly to +15 from +16. At the same time, the balance reporting export
sales rose marginally to +27 from +26. In services, the balance of firms reporting increasing
domestic sales fell to +19 from +22 and domestic orders dropped to +15 from +19. The balance
reporting increasing export sales came in at +13 versus +10 in the prior period. The balance of
manufacturers confident that turnover would improve over the next 12 months increased to +46
from +44, and the balance for services to +40 from +39. The percentage of businesses in both
manufacturing and services sectors attempting to recruit fell somewhat, but remain relatively
high. "The subdued growth picture also underlines the importance of getting as much clarity on
the Brexit transition as possible, as quickly as possible over the coming months," Adam Marshall,
Director General of the BCC, said.
Go-Ahead Group said on it has reached agreement with the UK Department for Transport
regarding the impact of industrial action on train performance at its partially-owned Govia
Thameslink Railway franchise. Provider of passenger transport services Go-Ahead owns 65% of
GTR, its rail joint venture with French transport group Keolis. Go-Ahead said following the
discussions, GTR will fund performance and passenger improvements in its service worth
13.4m. The group said the outcome is in line with financial judgements made by management
and, consequently, expectations for the year ended July 1 remain unchanged. Go-Ahead said at
its interim results in February the range of uncertainty around the profitability of its rail division for
the full-year was 15 million. This range related in part to the outcome of discussions with the
DfT regarding the impact of industrial action on train performance.
Oil prices were little changed on, pausing after the markets latest gains.
Gold prices tallied a third-straight gain, maintaining their short-term boost from political
uncertainty in the U.S.
Companies Reporting this Week
Day Companies

Today: AdEPT Telecom * Dart Group

Early Market Movements

Market Index Change % Change

UK 100 7,410.2 -6.7 -0.1%

UK 250 19,270.5 +2.6 +0.0%

GER 30 12,630.4 +3.9 +0.0%

FRA 40 5,227.3 +5.1 +0.1%

U.S. 30 21,532.14 +123.07 +0.6%

U.S. 500 2,443.3 +17.7 +0.7%

OIL (BRENT) 47.70 -0.04 -0.1%

GOLD 1,223.19 +2.68 +0.2%

UK Major Risers & Fallers - 8:15am

Company Price Change % Change
Babcock International 902 +32.5 +3.7%

Taylor Wimpey 180.6 +3.3 +1.9%

Howden Joinery 426.3 +5.8 +1.4%

Brown Group 282.9 -21.6 -7.1%

Astrazeneca 5022 -170 -3.3%

GKN 326.5 -4.2 -1.3%

Latest Broker Views

Company Broker Recommendation Price Target

Astrazeneca Citigroup Buy 5022 6,000

National Grid HSBC Buy 936.9 1060.00

Merlin Entertainments Barclays Capital Overweight 474.9 575.00

InterContinental Hotels Group Barclays Capital Equal Weight 4294.00 4,000.00

Forthcoming Economic Data

Time/Date Previous Forecast Outcome

1:30pm: U.S. PPI m/m 0.0% 0.0% -

1:30pm: U.S. Unemployment Claims 248k 245k -

3:00pm: U.S. Fed Chair Yellen Testifies - - -

Interbank Spot FX Rates - 08:05am

Pairing Rate % Change

GBP/USD 1.2939 +0.42%

EUR/USD 1.1450 +0.33%

GBP/EUR 1.1302 +0.12%

USD/JPY 113.1400 -0.03%

USD/CHF 0.9620 -0.35%

GBP/JPY 146.4320 +0.44%

Upcoming UK Dividend Dates

Company Dividend Ex Dividend Date
Halma 8.38p 13/07/2017

Safestore Holdings 4.2p 13/07/2017

WH Smith 14.6p 13/07/2017