De La Rue (DLAR) has issued a second profit warning in five months. The company, which suffered heavily from losing out on the Government’s contract to make new blue UK passports, said profits will be ‘significantly lower than market expectations’. Investors took flight, with shares plunging 20% in early trading, down 36p to 151p. The share price has now sunk nearly 65% since the start of the year. There is also an £18million black hole in the accounts after the company revealed in May that the Venezuelan central bank has been struggling to pay its bills.
AstraZeneca (AZN) has signed a $239million deal to sell a revenue-generating anti-psychotic drug as it bids to move away from mature treatments and invest in innovation. Germany’s Cheplapharm Arzneimittel bought the rights to sell schizophrenia and bipolar drugs Seroquel and Seroquel XR in Europe and Russia from the Anglo-Swedish pharmaceutical giant. It will pay $178 million upfront, but the figure could rise to $239million based on how well the drugs sell. ‘Seroquel is an important established medicine and this agreement with Cheplapharm will help ensure continued patient access,’ said Ruud Dobber, AstraZeneca’s executive vice president for biopharmaceuticals. ‘It forms part of our strategy of reducing the portfolio of mature medicines to enable reinvestment in our main therapy areas.’ AstraZeneca has already sold the rights to the two versions of Seroquel in the UK, Japan and elsewhere.
founder Mike Ashley has attacked the competition watchdog over its investigation into the takeover of Footasylum (FOOT) by JD Sports Fashion (JD.). Sports Direct claimed the Competition and Markets Authority published ‘incorrect estimates’ of its market share data in its analysis of the £90 million deal. The watchdog is looking at whether competition will be reduced following the acquisition of the high street retailer. The CMA has launched an in-depth phase two investigation after the regulator warned the deal could lead to ‘higher prices, less choice and a worse shopping experience for customers’. Sports Direct said the analysis ‘wrongly suggests that Sports Direct would have a comparable market share of supply to the merged parties’ in the sports-casual clothing and footwear categories. The retail giant said the CMA ‘substantially overstates’ its presence in each of these markets. It said it ‘does not have a meaningful, if any’ presence in these two retail markets. Ashley called for a ‘correction’ of its market share data by the watchdog during the second stage of the investigation.
Shares Next (NXT) tripped up in early trading on Wednesday despite the company reporting a sales uplift for the past three months. The fashion giant’s overall sales advanced by 2% in the most recent quarter, thanks to a stellar performance in October when temperatures in Britain started to drop. However, while its online Directory division surged by nearly 10% during the period, sales across its sprawling store estate continued to fall – this time by a bruising 6.3%. Next revealed that the month of August was particularly weak, with September also ‘adversely affected by unusually warm weather’. According to retail sales data from the British Retail Consortium and KPMG, last month was the worst September for retailers since at least 1995 as shoppers held back on spending amid the ‘spectre of no-deal’. The company claimed that its slow September had been offset by a 5% uplift in October.
Convatec Group (CTEC) rose as growth in four main divisions surged, stoking hopes that the troubled company was on the path to recovery after a shock profit warning last year.
Smurfit Kappa Group (SKG) clocked a rise after it said revenues were up 3% to £5.9 billion in the first nine months of the year and said it is well-positioned to benefit from the huge increase in demand for sustainable packaging.
