British business supplies distributor Bunzl (BNZL) posts a modest 3.9% rise in first half pre-tax profit to £257.9m, driven by gains from recent acquisitions.
The FTSE 100 company completed three acquisitions in the period, and there’s another one announced today. Bunzl has snapped up Oslo-based catering equipment supplier Enor, whose customers include hotels, restaurants, hospitals and fast food chains, and represents the UK firm’s first foray into Norway.
Shares in the company make modest progress in early trade on Tuesday, adding 1.2% to £23.59, in an unsurprisingly quiet return of trading after the bank holiday weekend. Bunzl also ups its interim dividend by 9% to 15.2p, which will likely please investors.
SLOW NEWS DAY FOR UK CORPORATES
Overall markets open on the front foot despite the relative lack of corporate announcements, the blue-chip FTSE 100 adding around 50 points in early deals, or roughly 0.7%, at 7,628.66 this morning.
Mid cap stocks are also on the up, the FTSE 250 opening with a rough 0.5% rise (about 105 points) at 20,797.29.
Europe’s biggest plastics packager RPC (RPC) is selling Letica Corp’s food-service packaging business to Graphic Packaging in a $95m debt-free deal.
It is a fairly small business sale in the grander scheme of things for RPC, which is valued at close on £3.2bn, after its share price rises 1.2% or so to 774p.
High street bank Lloyds (LLOY) has completed the £1bn share buyback programme it first unveiled on 8 March. Overall Lloyds repurchased 1,577,908,423 ordinary shares from shareholders, finishing its stock mopping up exercise on 24 August.
INVESTORS MIFFED BY SDX PROFITS SLIDE
Among smaller companies reporting today is North Africa-focused SDX Energy (SDX:AIM) which posted a smaller first half profit, though underlying earnings rose due to higher oil and gas prices.
Net income for the six months through June fell to $1.0m, down from $26.5m a year earlier, when the company recorded a one-off $29.4m gain on an acquisition.
Shares in SDX slide 5% to 58p, valuing the business at about £120m, with investors evidently a little concerned by the profits slide given the strength of oil prices through 2018.
The weekend press round up the possible falling through of turnaround engineering specialist Melrose Industries (MRO) plans to divest one of its US-based units, while there is also talk about GoCompare.com (GOCO) attracting potential takeover interest from private equity firm KKR, according to Bloomberg.
