■ Electronic components distributor Premier Farnell reported a 37 per cent fall in third quarter profits but said the period has seen further improvement
■ Tim Weller, chief financial officer (CFO) of United Utilities, is to jump ship to take over the CFO role at the Cable & Wireless division, Cable & Wireless Worldwide.
■ Sports Direct has lifted its full-year earnings expectations after higher sales from its shops helped the sports retailer shrug of a decline in its wholesale business
■ Begbies Traynor said results for the first half will be in-line with expectations and 'significantly' ahead of the same period last year
■ Luxury fashion brand Mulberry posted a 16 per cent rise in half-year pre-tax profit and, based on current trends, expects full-year results to be substantially ahead of market expectations.
■ Sable Mining Africa, the Aim listed resource investment company, announces that it has conditionally raised £27m via a placing of 270m new shares at the price of 10 pence each.
■ Private equity firm Francisco Partners has launched an agreed takeover for vehicle tracking technology company Cybit Holdings.
■ Packaging and office products wholesaler DS Smith expects to exceed full-year expectations after a 'relatively good first half' ().
■ Drug inhaler firm Consort Medical posted a 33 per cent drop in first half pre-tax profit after it met extra costs but expects full-year results to be broadly in-line with company expectations ().
Continues below...
■ HSBC confirmed yesterday that 10 of its wealthiest customers have had data about them stolen, but it was claimed today that as many of 4,000 clients have been affected.
■ Oilfield services group Hunting has snapped up Welltonic, a provider of well intervention services, for £9m.
■ Royal Mail made an interim operating profit of £184m, up by 4 per cent, as cost cuts offset a steady decline in mail volumes, but its pension fund deficit has soared to £10bn.
■ The collapse of a key competitor in November 2008 continues to benefit home entertainment products distributor MBL.
■ Image technology group Oxford Metrics Group (OMG) announced two contract wins for its subsidiaries today.
■ Adult stem cell storage bank operator Cryo-Save has, not surprisingly, welcomed the proposed new legislation in France supporting the collection and preservation of umbilical cord blood stem cells.
■ Industrial fabric maker Low & Bonar said second-half profit is expected to be materially better than the first half and in-line with company expectations.
■ Diamond miner Firestone Diamonds is to start development of commercial mining operations on its BK11 prospect in Botswana.
■ Shares in Clipper Windpower were swept higher by a partial offer from the technology giant UTC to buy 21.8m shares in the wind turbine generator at 180p a share.
■ Copper miner Kazakhmys has increased the stake it will sell in its Ekibastuz GRES -1 power plant from 25 per cent to 50 per cent.
■ Energy efficiency company Eaga expects to notch up double digit percentage growth in profits in the first half of its financial year.
■ Greetings card group International Greetings said it returned to profit in the six months ended 30 September 2009
■ Latin American oil and gas group Geopark has made a gas discovery in a new reservoir in its recently drilled Monte Aymond 34 well in Chile.
■ Menswear retailer Moss Bros said it had seen a 'marked improvement' in trading in the 18 weeks to 5 December, with like-for-like sales up 5.5 per cent.
■ Kazakhstan-focused oil and gas company Max Petroleum slipped deep into the red at the interim stage after taking a massive hit on credit facility restructuring costs.
FOR A SUMMARY OF LATEST MOVEMENTS IN EQUITY, COMMODITY AND CURRENCY MARKETS, SEE FT.COM'S MARKETS PAGE
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NEWSPAPER SHARE TIPS (10 DEC 2009):
Full round-up of newspaper share tips (sourced from Sharecast)
PRESS HEADLINES:
Citigroup is in advanced talks with regulators over plans to raise more than $15bn in an equity offering, in an effort to repay $20bn in bail-out funds as early as Thursday. People close to the situation said that Citi was also planning to raise around $2bn of mandatory convertible securities – a new form of security that converts into equity when a bank's capital ratio falls below a predetermined level, says the FT.
HSBC is closing in on acquiring the remaining Asian retail and commercial assets being divested by RBS. Sources said that the sides had struck a deal for the assets in China, India and Malaysia but that it was subject to regulatory approval in the three countries, writes the FT.
Royal Bank of Scotland has sent out sales documents for RBS Sempra Commodities, its American joint venture, and hopes to sell the energy trading business within the next few months, reports the Times.
About 20,000 bankers are expected to be snared by the Government's super-tax on bank bonuses announced in the pre-Budget report, the Telegraph has learned.
The Times adds that the Chancellor was accused of going soft on the City by producing a tax on bonuses that would be easy to avoid and which exempts, among others, former Lehman Brothers staff blamed for the financial crisis.
Lord Burns resigned as chairman of Welsh Water in protest over details he was given of alleged corruption at the company, The Times has learnt. People close to the company said yesterday that Lord Burns, who is the newly appointed chairman of Channel 4, was "absolutely appalled and disgusted" by the details that emerged in the inquiry at the company, which is continuing, according to the Times.
India's stock market regulator has suspended Barclays from dealing in notes that enable off-shore investors to trade Indian stocks. The regulator alleged that Barclays had given it false information on clients that had bought shares of Reliance Communications, the mobile operator controlled by Indian billionaire Anil Ambani, through offshore derivatives known as participatory notes, says the FT.
The Chancellor has made a "serious mistake" by increasing National Insurance and risks damaging an economic recovery, according to business leaders. Richard Lambert, the director-general of the CBI, said that increasing National Insurance contributions by 0.5pc from April 2011 could "hold back jobs creation and growth", writes the Telegraph.
A litany of organisational failures compounded by outdated systems means that HM Revenue & Customs will fail to collect £11.2 billion in taxes. A report from the Commons Public Accounts Committee, that will be published today, shows that 40 per cent of £27.7 billion of the tax that was uncollected by March 31 is unlikely ever to reach the public purse, reports the Times.
