The following stocks are the leading risers and fallers among London Main Market small-caps on Tuesday.
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SMALL-CAP - WINNERS
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Care REIT PLC, up 33% at 108.40 pence, 12-month range 77.60p-110.00p. Tuesday’s surge gives it a market capitalisation of £449.2 million. The firm agrees to a £448 million takeover from US real estate investment trust CareTrust Inc. NYSE-listed CareTrust, focused on seniors housing and healthcare-related properties, will pay 108p in cash per Care REIT share. It represents a 33% premium to Care REIT’s closing price of 81.3p on Monday. The owner of care homes and other healthcare properties deems the takeover price ‘fair and reasonable’. The takeover already has the support of around 3% of Care REIT shareholders.
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Costain Group PLC, up 9.6% at 114.00 pence, 12-month range 62.00p-114.00p. The construction and engineering firm hits this 12-month high, also its best level in five years, on the back of well-received annual results. Pretax profit in 2024 rises 18% to £36.5 million from £30.9 million. Revenue declines 6.1% to £1.25 billion from £1.33 billion, ‘reflecting the timing of contract starts and completions’ in its Transportation offering. Costain doubles its annual dividend to 2.4p per share from 1.2p. Its final dividend is multiplied to 2.0p from 0.8p. its combined order book and preferred bidder book stands at £5.4 billion at the end of last year, up from £3.9 billion at the end of 2023.
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SMALL-CAP - LOSERS
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Synthomer PLC, down 7.7% at 128.00p, 12-month range 122.00p-338.00p. The developer of highly specialised polymers says its pretax loss in 2024 stretches to £87.3 million from £53.7 million when factoring in discontinued operations. From continuing operations only, its operating loss shrinks to £24.1 million from £39.5 million. Revenue advances 2.4% to £1.99 billion from £1.94 billion, however. ‘We are pleased to report robust financial and strategic progress in 2024, with growth in profitability driven by our self-help cost and reliability programmes and our strategic repositioning continuing to build momentum. Although overall demand in our end markets is recovering only slowly at this stage and the global economy faces a high degree of macroeconomic and political uncertainty, our strategic transformation continues to enhance our ability to convert increasing volumes into substantially greater profitability and returns,’ CEO Michael Willome says. Current trading is in line with expectations, ‘which assumed a muted start to the year compared with 2024’.
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Headlam PLC, down 5.5% at 104.00p, 12-month range 103.93p-191.98p. The floorcoverings distributor reports weaker annual results, and says revenue so far in 2025 has shrunk. Headlam swings to a pretax loss of £41.5 million in 2024 from profit of £7.1 million in 2023. Revenue falls 9.7% to £593.1 million from £656.5 million. ‘In the face of ongoing market weakness, 2024 has seen Headlam accelerate a major strategic restructuring of the group. At its heart, this transformation plan will simplify our customer offer, simplify our network and simplify our operations, positioning the group to increase market share, structurally improve profitability and reduce the capital intensity of the business. We have made strong early progress on our plan and, today, upgrade the expected financial benefits from it,’ CEO Chris Payne says. Revenue for January and February 2025 declines 6% compared to the previous year, Headlam says. It adds: ‘The various external forecasts for flooring and related markets point to the flooring market returning to modest growth in 2025, albeit the timing and pace of recovery remains highly uncertain and could be influenced by macroeconomic and geopolitical developments.’
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