Market overview: 17 April

• The tills are still ringing like billy-o in the food halls of retail bellwether Marks and Spencer but the group confessed that trading in other parts of the store was more mixed in the first three months of 2011.

• Underlying revenue growth at luxury brand Burberry eased in the fourth quarter owing to a slowdown in growth at its Wholesale division.

• Mining giant Rio Tinto said production of copper and iron ore fell in the first quarter of 2012 compared with the final three months of last year.

• Luxury interior furnishings group Walker Greenbank unveiled a solid set of full year results, helped by a strong international performance, and is confident for the year ahead.

• Euromoney Institutional Investor , the publisher and exhibitions organiser, kept the top line growing in the first half of its financial year despite the depressed state of the advertising market.

• MP Evans , the producer of Indonesian palm oil and Australian beef cattle, brought new plantations on stream just in time last year to take advantage of historically high palm oil prices (IC COMMENT).

• Diversified mining giant Eurasian Natural Resources Corp has completed the acquisition of thermal coal group Shubarkol Komir JSC, which is expected to enhance the company's position as a leading coal producer in Kazakhstan.

• Daily Mail & General Trust , the owners of an empire that spans events management, business data and, of course, newspapers is suffering from a decline in ad revenue but online income is growing.

• Information management firm SDL said demand for its products remained stable as it updated the market on its first quarter performance.

• Afren thinks it might have struck it big in the Kurdistan region of Iraq with its Simrit-2 exploration well.

• Milk, cheese and spreads group Dairy Crest is looking to close two of its dairies and has revealed that a Tesco contract will not be renewed.

• Digital radio maker Sepura said profit for the year ended march 2012 is expected to come in comfortably ahead of market expectations after strong sales and significant cost savings following its restructuring programme.

• Copper, gold and silver company Vane Minerals has risen this morning after announcing positive digging results in New Mexico.

• Mobile phone networks giant Vodafone has cranked up its dispute with the Indian government by serving notice that it is prepared to go to international arbitration over India's plans to introduce a retrospective tax law which will hit the UK-based company hard.

• Corac , the engineering technology company, has risen sharply in morning trading after revealing reduced losses and emphasising the potential of its recent purchase of Wellman Hunt Graham and Wellman Defence. A new design for a modular compression system also appears to have boosted hopes for the firm.

• Shares in technology investment firm Angle rose on Tuesday after it said its Parsortix cell separation device had passed an important milestone.

• Online software development firm Playtech is to splash €95m on "certain B2B real money gaming and B2B social media assets" as it looks to enter the social gaming arena.

• Manroy , the UK manufacturer of machine guns, has revealed the US Department of Defense has exchanged contracts worth a total of 6.6m pounds with Manroy USA (MUSA) in which Manroy owns a 49 per cent interest.

• Transmission products firm Renold saw its shares drop over nine per cent on Tuesday morning after it said growth had slowed in the second half.

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